CONIENTMT 

TMET  THAT  FIND  IT  NOT 
YYITM  BOOIWMEARTM 
ARE  flTIADLE  INDEED 


LEE  HERTON  TYATSON 


2\  11(5  BOOK 


THE    WORKS 


ISAAC    DISRAELI. 


THE 

L 


CALAMITIES  AND  QUARRELS 


or 


AUTHORS: 

WITH 

SOME    INQUIRIES    RESPECTING    THEIR    MORAL    AND 
LITERARY  CHARACTERS, 

By    ISAAC    DISEAELI. 

EDITED  BY  HIS  SON, 

THE    EIGHT    HON.    B.    DISRAELI. 

IN  TWO  VOLUMES. 
VOL.   I. 


NEW    YORK: 

W.    J.    WIDDLETON,    PUBLISHER, 

1875. 


Cambridge  : 
Prttxvcrk  by  John  Wilson  and  Son, 


VN 

ids' 
i'i 

VI 


CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS: 


INCLUDING 


SOME  INQUIRIES  RESPECTING  THEIR  MORAL  AND 
LITERARY  CHARACTERS. 


"  Such  a  superiority  do  the  pursuits  of  Literature  possess  above  every  other  occupa- 
tion, that  even  he  who  attains  but  a  mediocrity  in  them,  merits  the  pre-eminence  abovo 
those  that  excel  the  most  in  the  common  and  vulgar  professions."— Hume. 


CONTENTS. 


CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

PAGK 

Preface 9 

Authors  by  Profession : — Guthrie  and  Amhurst — Drake — Smollett     13 
The  case  of  Authors  stated,  including  the  History   of  Literary 

Property 26 

The  Sufferings  of  Authors  36 

A  Mendicant  Author,  and  the  Patrons  of  Former  Times    .        .        41 

Cowley — Of  his  Melancholy 56 

The  Pains  of  Fastidious  Egotism 66 

Influence  of  a  Bad  Temper  in  Criticism 80 

Disappointed  Genius  takes  a  Fatal  Direction  by  its  Abuse        .        91 

The  Maladies  of  Authors 103 

Literary  Scotchmen 116 

Laborious  Authors 129 

The  Despair  of  Young  Poets 152 

The  Miseries  of  the  First  English  Commentator    .        .        .        .160 

The  Life  of  an  Authoress 1 64 

Indiscretion  of  an  Historian — Carte 170 

Literary  Ridicule,  illustrated  by  some  Account  of  a  Literary  Satire  175 
Literary  Hatred,  exhibiting  a  Conspiracy  against  an  Author      .       200 


8  CONTEXTS. 

PAoa 
Undue  Severity  of  Criticism 213 

A  Voluminous  Author  without  Judgment         ....  225 

Genius  and  Erudition  the  Victims  of  Immoderate  Vanity     .  .  233 

Genius,  the  Dupe  of  its  Passions 257 

Literary  Disappointments  disordering  the  Intellect      .        .  .  2G3 

Rewards  of  Oriental  Students 2S4 

Danger  incurred  by  giving  the  Result  of  Literary  Inquiries  .  .  294 

A  National  "Work  which  could  find  no  Patronage      .        .        .  305 

Miseries  of  Successful  Authors 309 

The  Illusions  of  "Writers  in  Verse 324 

Index 345 


PKEFACE. 


The  Calamities  of  Authors  have  often  excited  the  attention 
of  the  lovers  of  literature  ;  and,  from  the  revival  of  letters  to 
this  clay,  this  class  of  the  community,  the  most  ingenious  and 
the  most  enlightened,  have,  in  all  the  nations  of  Europe,  been 
the  most  honoured,  and  the  least  remunerated.  Pierius  Vale- 
rianus,  an  attendant  in  the  literary  court  of  Leo  X.,  who  twice 
refused  a  bishopric  that  he  might  pursue  his  studies  uninter- 
rupted, was  a  friend  of  Authors,  and  composed  a  small  work, 
"De  Infelicitate  Literatorum,"  which  has  been  frequently  re- 
printed.* It  forms  a  catalogue  of  several  Italian  literati,  his 
contemporaries  ;  a  meagre  performance,  in  which  the  author 
shows  sometimes  a  predilection  for  the  marvellous,  which 
happens  so  rarely  in  human  affairs;  and  he  is  so  unphilosoph- 
ical,  that  he  places  among  the  misfortunes  of  literary  men 
those  fatal  casualties  to  which  all  men  are  alike  liable.  Yet 
even  this  small  volume  has  its  value:  for  although  the  his- 
torian confines  his  narrative  to  his  own  times,  he  includes  a 
sufficient  number  of  names  to  convince  us  that  to  devote  our 
life  to  authorship  is  not  the  true  means  of  improving  our 
happiness  or  our  fortune. 

At  a  later  period,  a  congenial  work  was  composed  by  The- 
ophilus  Spizelius,  a  German  divine;  his  four  volumes  are  after 
the  fashion  of  his  country  and  his  times,  which  could  make 

*  A  modern  writer  observes,  that  "  Valeriano  is  chiefly  known  to  the 
present  times  by  his  brief  but  curious  and  interesting  work,  De  Litera- 
torum Infelicitate,  which  has  preserved  many  anecdotes  of  the  principal 
scholars  of  the  age,  not  elsewhere  to  be  found." — Roscoe's  Leo  X.  voL 
iv.  p.  175. 


10  PREFACE. 

even  small  things  ponderous.  In  1680  he  first  published  two 
volumes,  entitled  "  Infelix  Literatus,"  and  five  years  after- 
wards his  "  Felicissimus  Literatus;"  he  writes  without  size, 
and  sermonises  without  end,  and  seems  to  have  been  so  grave 
a  lover  of  symmetry,  that   he  shapes  his  Felicities  just  with 

ime  measure  as  his  Infelicities.     These  two  equalised 
bundles  of  hay  might  have  held  in  suspense  the  casuistical 

ne,  till  he  had  died  from  want  of  a  motive  to  i 
either.     Yet  Spizelius  is  not  to  be  contemned  because  he  is 
verbose  and  heavy  ;   he  has  reflected  more  deeply  than  Vale- 
rianic, by  opening  the  moral  causes  of  those  calamities  which 
he  describi  s.* 

The  chief  object  of  the  present  work  is  to  ascertain  some 
doubtful  yet  important  points  concerning  Authors.  The  title 
of  Author  still  retains  its  seduction  among  our  youth,  and  is 
consecrated  by  ages.  Yet  what  affectionate  parent  would 
consent  to  see  his  son  devote  himself  to  his  pen  as  a  profes- 
sion ?  The  studies  of  a  true  Author  insulate  him  in  society, 
exacting  daily  labours  ;  yet  he  will  receive  but  little  encour- 
agement,  and  less  remuneration.  It  will  be  found  that  the 
most  successful  Author  can  obtain  no  equivalent  for  the  la- 

of  his  life.  I  have  endeavoured  to  ascertain  this  fact, 
to  develope  the  causes  and  to  paint  the  variety  of  evils  that 
naturally  result  from  the  disappointments  of  genius.  Authors 
themselves  never  discover  this  melancholy  truth  till  they  have 
yielded  to  an  impulse,  and  adopted  a  profession,  too  late  in 
•  the  one,  or  abandon  the  other.  Whoever  labours 
without  hope,  a  painful  state  to  which  Authors  are  at  length 
!,  may  surely  be  placed  among  the  most  injured  class 
in  the  community.  Most  Authors  close  their  lives  in  apathy 
or  despair,  and  too  many  live  by  means  which  few  of  them 
would  not  blush  to  describe. 

*  There  i-  also  a  bulky  collection  of  this  kind,  entitled,  AnaUda  de 
•  it  f.Hcratomm,  edited  by  MeDcken,  the  author  of  CharLitaneria 
Eru-Ltorum. 


PREFACE.  11 

Besides  this  perpetual  struggle  with  penury,  there  are  also 
moral  causes  which  influence  the  literary  character.  I  have 
drawn  the  individual  characters  and  feelings  of  Authors  from 
their  own  confessions,  or  deduced  them  from  the  prevalent 
events  of  their  lives ;  and  often  discovered  them  in  their 
secret  history,  as  it  floats  on  tradition,  or  lies  concealed  in 
authentic  and  original  documents.  I  would  paint  what  has 
not  heen  unhappily  called  the  psi/chohr/ical  character.* 

I  have  limited  my  inquiries  to  our  own  country,  and  gen- 
erally to  recent  times ;  for  researches  more  curious,  and  eras 
more  distant,  would  less  forcibly  act  on  our  sympathy.  If, 
in  attempting  to  avoid  the  naked  brevity  of  Valerianus,  I 
have  taken  a  more  comprehensive  view  of  several  of  our 
Authors,  it  has  been  with  the  hope  that  I  was  throwing  a 
new  light  on  their  characters,  or  contributing  some  fresh 
materials  to  our  literary  history.  I  feel  anxious  for  the  fate 
of  the  opinions  and  the  feelings  which  have  arisen  in  the  pro- 
gress and  diversity  of  this  work ;  but  whatever  their  errors 
may  be,  it  is  to  them  that  my  readers  at  least  owe  the  mate- 
rials of  which  it  is  formed  ;  these  materials  will  be  received 
with  consideration,  as  the  confessions  and  statements  of  genius 
itself.  In  mixing  them  with  my  own  feelings,  let  me  apply 
a  beautiful  apologue  of  the  Hebrews — "  The  clusters  of  grapes 
sent  out  of  Babylon  implore  favour  for  the  exuberant  leaves 
of  the  vine ;  for  had  there  been  no  leaves,  you  had  lost  the 
grapes." 

*  From  the  Grecian  Psyche,  or  the  soul,  the  Germans  have  borrowed 
this  expressive  term.  They  have  a  Psychological  Magazine.  Some  of 
our  own  recent  authors  have  adopted  the  term  peculiarly  adapted  to  the 
historian  of  the  human  mind. 


THE 

CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 


AUTHORS  BY  PROFESSION. 

GUTHRIE    AND    AMHURST DRAKE SMOLLETT. 

A  GREAT  author  once  surprised  me  by  inquiring 
-*—*-  what  I  meant  by  "an  Author  by  Profession." 
He  seemed  offended  at  the  supposition  that  I  was  cre- 
ating an  odious  distinction  between  authors.  I  was 
only  placing  it  among  their  calamities. 

The  title  of  Author  is  venerable ;  and  in  the  ranks  of 
national  glory,  authors  mingle  with  its  heroes  and  its 
patriots.  It  is  indeed  by  our  authors  that  foreigners 
have  been  taught  most  to  esteem  us ;  and  this  remark- 
ably appears  in  the  expression  of  Gemelli,  the  Italian 
traveller  round  the  world,  who  wrote  about  the  year 
1700  ;  for  he  told  all  Europe  that  "  he  could  find  nothing 
amongst  us  but  our  writings  to  distinguish  us  from  the 
worst  of  barbarians."  But  to  become  an  "  Author  by 
Profession,"  is  to  have  no  other  means  of  subsistence 
than  such  as  are  extracted  from  the  quill ;  and  no  one 
believes  these  to  be  so  precarious  as  they  really  are, 
until  disappointed,  distressed,  and  thrown  out  of  evei-y 


14  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

pursuit  which   can  maintain  independence,  the  noblest 

mind  is  cast  into  the  lot  of  a  doomed  labourer. 

Literature   abounds   with   instances   of  "Authors   by 

Profession"  accommodating  themselves  to  this  condition. 

By  vile  artifices  of  faction  and  popularity  their  moral 

Sense  is  injured,  and  the  literary  character  sits  in  that 

study  which  he  ought  to  dignify,  merely,  as  one  of  them 

sings, 

To  keep  his  mutton  twirling  at  the  tire. 

Another  has  said,  "  He  is  a  fool  who  is  a  grain 
honester  than  the  times  he  lives  in." 

Let  it  not,  therefore,  be  conceived  that  I  mean  to 
degrade  or  vilify  the  literary  character,  when  I  would 
only  separate  the  Author  fiom  chose  poliutors  of  the 
press  who  have  turned  a  vestal  into  a  prostitute;  a 
grotesque  race  of  famished  buffoons  or  laughing  assas- 
sins; or  that  populace  of  unhappy  beings,  who  are 
driven  to  perish  in  their  garrets,  unknown  and  unre- 
garded by  all,  for  illusions  which  even  their  calamities 
cannot  disperse.  Poverty,  said  an  ancient,  is  a  sacred 
thing— it  is,  indeed,  so  sacred,  that  it  creates  a  sympathy 
even  for  those  who  have  incurred  it  by  their  folly,  or 
plead  by  it  for  their  crimes. 

The  history  of  our  Literature  is  instructive — let   us 

the  origin  of  characters  of  this  sort  among  us: 

some  of  them  have  happily  disappeared,  and,  whenever 

great    authors   obtain    their    due    rights,  the    calamities 

of  literature   will  be  greatly  diminished. 

As  for  the  phrase  of  "Authors  by  Profession,"  it  is 
o  be  of  modern  origin ;  and  Guthrie,  a  great  dealer 


AUTHORS   BY    PROFESSION.  15 

in  literature,  and  a  political  scribe,  is  thought  to  have 
introduced  it,  as  descriptive  of  a  class  of  writers  which 
he  wished  to  distinguish  from  the  general  term.  I 
present  the  reader  with  an  unpublished  letter  of  Guthrie, 
in  which  the  phrase  will  not  only  be  found,  but,  what 
is  more  important,  which  exhibits  the  character  in  its 
degraded  form.     It  was  addressed  to  a  minister. 

"  My  Lord,  June  ?>,  1762. 

"In  the  year  1745-6,  Mr.  Pelham,  then  First  Lord 
of  the  Treasury,  acquainted  me,  that  it  was  his  Majesty's 
pleasure  I  should  receive,  till  better  provided  for,  which 
never  has  happened,  2007.  a-year,  to  be  paid  by  him  and 
his  successors  in  the  Treasury.  I  was  satisfied  with  the 
august  name  made  use  of,  and  the  appointment  has 
been  regularly  and  quarterly  paid  me  ever  since.  I 
have  been  equally  punctual  in  doing  the  government  all 
the  services  that  fell  within  my  abilities  or  sphere  of 
life,  especially  in  those  critical  situations  that  call  for 
unanimity  in  the  seiwice  of  the  crown. 

"  Your  Lordship  may  possibly  now  suspect  that  I  am 
an  Author  by  Profession :  you  are  not  deceived  ;  and 
will  be  less  so,  if  you  believe  that  I  am  disposed  to 
serve  his  Majesty  under  your  Lordship's  future  patron- 
age and  protection,  with  greater  zeal,  if  possible,  than 

ever. 

"I  have  the  honour  to  be, 

"  My  Lord,  &c, 

"  William  Guthrie." 

Unblushing  venality  !     In  one  part  he  shouts  like  a 

plundering  hussar  who  has  carried  off  his  prey;    and 


1(5  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

in  the  other  he  bow?  with  the  tame  suppleness  of  the 
"quarterly"  Swiss  chaffering  his  halbert  for  his  price  ; — 
"to  serve  his  Majesty"  for — "his  Lordship's  future 
patronage." 

Guthrie's  notion  of  "An  Author  by  Profession," 
entirely  derived  from  his  own  character,  was  twofold; 
literary  taskwork,  and   political    degradation.     He  was 

to  be  a  gentleman  convertible  into  an  historian,  at 

per  sheet ;  and,  when  he  had  not  time  to  write  histories, 
he  chose  to  sell  his  name  to  those  he  never  wrote. 
These  are  mysteries  of  the  craft  of  authorship;  in  this 
6ense  it  is  only  a  trade,  and  a  very  bad  one  !  But  when 
in  his  other  capacity,  this  gentleman  comes  to  hire 
himself  to  one  lord  as  he  had  to  another,  no  one  can 
doubt  that  the  stipendiary  would  change  his  principles 
with  his  livery.* 

Such  have  been  some  of  the  "  Authors  by  Profes- 
sion" who  have  worn  the  literary  mask;  for  literature 
was  not  the  first  object  of  their  designs.  They  form  a 
race  peculiar  to  our  country.  They  opened  their  career 
in  our  first  great  revolution,  and  flourished  during  the 
eventful  period  of  the  civil  wars.  In  the  form  of  news- 
papers, their  "  Mercuries"  and  "Diurnals"  were  political 
pamphlet8.f     Of  these,  the  Royalists,  being  the  b 

*  It  lias  been  lately  disclosed  that  Home,  the  author  of  "  Douglas." 
Lord  Bute  to  answer  all  the  papers  and  pamphlets 
of  the  Government,  and  to  be  a  vigilant  defender  of  the  measures  of 
Govern] 

t  I  '■  '  f-re  portrayed  the  personal  characters  of  the  hire- 

wars:    the    versatile    and    unprincipled 
M  am,  the  Cobbett  of  his  day:   the  factious  Sir  Roger 

Sir  John  Birkenhead. 


AUTHORS  BY  PROFESSION".  17 

educated,  carried  off  to  their  side  all  the  spirit,  and  only 
left  the  foam  and  dregs  for  the  Parliamentarians ;  other- 
wise, in  lying,  they  were  just  like  one  another;  for 
"the  father  of  lies"  seems  to  he  of  no  party!  Were 
it  desirable  to  instruct  men  hy  a  system  of  political  and 
moral  calumny,  the  complete  art  might  be  drawn  from 
these  archives  of  political  lying,  during  their  flourishing 
era.  We  might  discover  principles  among  them  which 
would  have  humbled  the  genius  of  Machiavel  himself, 
and  even  have  taught  Mr.  Sheridan's  more  popular 
scribe,  Mr.  Puff",  a  sense  of  his  own  inferiority. 

It  is  known  that,  during  the  administration  of  Harley 
and  Walpole,  this  class  of  authors  swarmed  and  started 
up  like  mustard-seed  in  a  hot-bed.  More  than  fifty 
thousand  pounds  were  expended  among  them !  Fac- 
tion, with  mad  and  blind  passions,  can  affix  a  value  on 
the  basest  things  that  serve  its  purpose.*  These 
"Authors  by  Profession"  wrote  more  assiduously  the 
better  they  were  paid ;  but  as  attacks  only  produced 
replies  and  rejoinders,  to  remunerate  them  was  height- 
ening the  fever  and  feeding  the  disease.  They  were 
all  fighting  for  present  pay,  with  a  view  of  the  promised 
land  before  them ;  but  they  at  length  became  so  numer- 
ous, and  so  crowded  on  one  another,  that  the  minister 
could  neither  satisfy  promised  claims  nor  actual  dues. 
He  had  not  at  last  the  humblest  office  to  bestow,  not 
a  commissionership  of  wine  licences,  as  Tacitus  Gordon 
had :  not  even  a  collectorship  of  the  customs  in  some 

*  An  ample  view  of  these  lucubrations  is  exhibited  in  the  early 
volumes  of  the  Gentleman's  Magazine. 
2 


IS  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

obscure  town,  as  was  the  wretched  worn-out  Oldmixon's 
pittance;*  not  a  crumb  for  a  mouse. 

The  captain  ot  this  banditti  in  the  administration  of 
Walpole  was  Arnall,  a  young  attorney,  whose  mature 
genius  for  scurrilous  party-papers  broke  forth  in  his 
tender  nonage.  This  hireling  was  "The  Free  Briton," 
and  in  "The  Gazetteer"  Francis  Walsingham,  Esq., 
abusing  the  name,  of  a  profound  statesman.  It  is  said 
that  he  received  above  ten  thousand  pounds  for  his 
obscure  labours;  and  this  patriot  was  suffered  to  retire 
with  all  the  dignity  which  a  pension  could  confer.  He 
not  only  wrote  for  hire,  but  valued  himself  on  it ;  proud 
of  the  pliancy  of  his  pen  and  of  his  principles,  he  wrote 
without  remorse  what  his  patron  was  forced  to  pay  for, 
but  to  disavow.  It  was  from  a  knowledge  of  these 
"Authors  by  Profession,"  writers  of  a  faction  in  the 
name  of  the  community,  as  they  have  been  well  de- 
scribed, that  our  great  statesman  Pitt  fell  into  an  error 

*  It  was  said  of  this  man  that  "ho  had  submitted  to  labour  at  the 
press,  like  a  horse  in  a  mill,  till  he  became  as  blind  and  as  wretched." 
To  show  the  extent  of  the  conscience  of  this  class  of  writers,  and  to 
what  lengths  mere  party-writers  can  proceed,  when  duly  encouraged, 
Oldmixon,  who  was  a  Whig  historian,  if  a  violent  party-writer  ought 
ever  to  be  dignified  by  so  venerable  a  title,  unmercifully  rigid  to  all 
other  historians,  was  himself  guilt}'  of  the  crimes  with  which  he  so 
loudly   accused    others.      He  charged    three   eminent   persons   witli 
rpolaling  Lord   Clarendon's   History;  this  charge  was  afterwards 
j    -    being   produced  in   his  Lordship's  own 
[writing,   which   had   been   fortunately  preserved;  and   yet  this 
interpolation,  when  employed  by  Bishop  Kcnnett  to  pub- 
lish   I  ion  of  our  historians,   made  no   scruple  of  falsifying 
nun  •  d  Daniel's  Chronicle,  which  makes  the  first  edition 
of  that  collection  of  no  value. 


AUTHORS   BY   PROFESSION.  19 

which  he  lived  to  regret.  He  did  not  distinguish 
between  authors ;  he  confounded  the  mercenary  with 
the  men  of  talent  and  character ;  and  with  this  con- 
tracted view  of  the  political  influence  of  genius,  he  must 
have  viewed  with  awe,  perhaps  with  surprise,  its  mighty 
labour  in  the  volumes  of  Burke. 

But  these  "  Authors  by  Profession  "  sometimes  found 
a  retribution  of  their  crimes  even  from  their  masters. 
"When  the  ardent  patron  was  changed  into  a  cold  minis- 
ter, their  pen  seemed  wonderfully  to  have  lost  its  point, 
and  the  feather  could  not  any  more  tickle.  They  were 
flung  off,  as  Shakspeare's  striking  imagery  expresses  it,  like 

An  unregarded  bulrush  on  the  stream, 
To  rot  itself  with  motion. 

Look  on  the  fate  and  fortune  of  Amhurst.  The  life 
of  this  "  Author  by  Profession  "  points  a  moral.  He 
flourished  about  the  year  1730.  He  passed  through  a 
youth  of  iniquity,  and  was  expelled  his  college  for  his  ir- 
regularities :  he  had  exhibited  no  marks  of  regeneration 
when  he  assailed  the  university  with  the  periodical  paper 
of  the  Terrce  Filius  /  a  witty  Saturnalian  effusion  on  the 
manners  and  Toryism  of  Oxford,  where  the  portraits  have 
an  extravagant  kind  of  likeness,  and  are  so  false  and  so 
true  that  they  were  universally  relished  and  individually 
understood.  Amhurst,  having  lost  his  character,  has- 
tened to  reform  the  morals  and  politics  of  the  nation. 
For  near  twenty  years  he  toiled  at  "  The  Craftsman," 
of  which  ten  thousand  are  said  to  have  been  sold  in  one 
day.  Admire  this  patriot !  an  expelled  collegian  be- 
comes an  outrageous  zealot  for  popular  reform,  and  an 


20  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHOR?. 

intrepid  Whig  can  Lend  to  be  yoked  to  all  the  drudgery 
of  a  faction!  Arahurst  succeeded  in  writing  out  the 
minister,  and  writing  in  Bolingbroke  and  Pulteney. 
Now  came  the  hour  of  gratitude  and  generosity.  His 
patrons  mounted  into  power — but — they  silently  dropped 
the  instrument  of  their  ascension.  The  political  prosti- 
tute stood  shivering  at  the  gate  of  preferment,  which 
his  masters  had  for  ever  ilung  against  him.  lie  died 
brokenduarted,  ami  owed  the  charity  of  a  grave  to  his 
bookseller. 

I  must  add  one  more  striking  example  of  a  political 
author  in  the  case  of  Dr.  James  Drake,  a  man  of  genius, 
and  an  excellent  writer.  lie  resigned  an  honourable 
profession,  that  of  medicine,  to  adopt  a  very  contrary 
one,  that  of  becoming  an  author  by  profession  for  a 
party.  As  a  Tory  writer,  he  dared  every  extremity  of 
the  law,  while  he  evaded  it  by  every  subtlety  of  artifice  ; 
he  sent  a  masked  lady  with  his  MS.  to  the  printer,  who 
was  never  discovered,  and  was  once  saved  by  a  flaw  in 
the  indictment  from  the  simple  change  of  an  r  for  a  /, 
or  nor  for  not; — one  of  those  shameful  evasions  by 
which  the  law,  to  its  perpetual  disgrace,  so  often  pro- 
tects the  criminal  from  punishment.  Dr.  Drake  had  the 
honour  of  hearing  himself  censured  from  the  throne; 
of  being  imprisoned;  of  seeing  his  ".Memorials  of  the 
Church  of  England"  burned  :it  London,  and  his"IIis- 
toria  Anglo-Scotica "  at  Edinburgh.  Having  enlisted 
himself  in  tin-  pay  of  the  booksellers,  among  other  works, 
I  suspect,  he  condescended  to  practise  some  literary 
impositions.      For    he    has    reprinted   Father  Parson's 


AUTHORS   BY   PROFESSION.  2X 

famous  libel  against  the  Earl  of  Leicester  in  Elizabeth's 
reign,  under  the  title  of  "Secret  Memoirs  of  Robert 
Dudley,  Earl  of  Leicester,  1706,"  8vo,  with  a  preface 
pretending  it  was  printed  from  an  old  MS. 

Drake  was  a  lover  of  literature ;  he  left  behind  him 
a  version  of  Herodotus,  and  a  "  System  of  Anatomy," 
once  the  most  popular  and  curious  of  its  kind.  After 
all  this  turmoil  of  his  literary  life,  neither  his  masked 
lady  nor  the  flaws  in  his  indictments  availed  him. 
Government  brought  a  writ  of  error,  severely  prose- 
cuted him;  and,  abandoned,  as  usual,  by  those  for 
whom  he  had  annihilated  a  genius  which  deserved  a 
better  fate,  his  perturbed  spirit  broke  out  into  a  fever, 
and  he  died  raving  against  cruel  persecutors,  and  pa- 
trons not  much  more  humane. 

So  much  for  some  of  those  who  have  been  "  Authors 
by  Profession"  in  one  of  the  twofold  capacities  which 
Guthrie  designed,  that  of  writing  for  a  minister;  the 
other,  that  of  writing  for  the  bookseller,  though  far  more 
honourable,  is  sufficiently  calamitous. 

In  commercial  times,  the  hope  of  profit  is  always  a 
stimulating,  but  a  degrading  motive ;  it  dims  the  clear- 
est intellect,  it  stills  the  proudest  feelings.  Habit  and 
prejudice  will  soon  reconcile  even  genius  to  the  work 
of  money,  and  to  avow  the  motive  without  a  blush. 
"  An  author  by  profession,"  at  once  ingenious  and  ingen- 
uous, declared  that,  "  till  fame  appears  to  be  worth  more 
than  money,  he  would  always  prefer  money  to  fame." 
Johnson  had  a  notion  that  there  existed  no  motive  for 
writing  but  money !     Yet,  crowned  heads  have  sighed 


22  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

with  the  ambition  of  authorship,  though  this  great 
:•  of  the  human  mind  could  suppose  that  on  this 
subject  men  were  not  actuated  either  by  the  love  of 
or  of  pleasure  !  Fielding,  an  author  of  great 
genius  and  of  "  the  profession,"  in  one  of  his  "  Covent- 
garden  Journals''  asserts,  that  "An  author,  in  a  country 
where  there  is  no  public  provision  for  men  of  genius, 
is  not  obliged  to  be  a  more  disinterested  patriot  than 
any  other.  Why  is  he  whose  livelihood  is  in  his  pen 
a  greater  monster  in  using  it  to  serve  himself,  than  he 
who  uses  his  tongue  for  the  same  purpose?" 

But  it  is  a  very  important  question  to  ask,  is  this 
"livelihood  in  the  pen"  really  such?  Authors  drudg- 
ing on  in  obscurity,  and  enduring  miseries  which  can 
never  close  but  with  their  life — shall  this  be  worth  eveD 
the  humble  designation  of  a  "  livelihood  ?"  I  am  not 
now  combating  with  them  whether  their  taskwork  de 
grades  them,  but  whether  they  are  receiving  an  equiva- 
lent for  the  violation  of  their  genius,  for  the  weight  of 
the  fetters  they  are  wearing,  and  for  the  entailed  mis- 
.  hich  form  an  author's  sole  legacies  to  his  widow 
and  his  children.  Far  from  me  is  the  wish  to  degrade 
literature  by  the  inquiry;  but  it  will  be  useful  to  many 
th  of  promising  talent,  who  is  impatient  to  aban- 
don all  professions  for  this  one,  to  consider  well  the 
calamities  in  which  he  will  most  probably  participate. 

Among  "Authors  by  Profession "  who  has  displayed 
a  more  fruitful  genius,  and  exercised  more  intense  in- 
dustry,  with  a  lofti  of  his  independence,  than 

Smollett?      But  look   into  his    life  and   enter   into   his 


AUTITOKS   BY   PROFESSION.  23 

feelings,  and  you  will  be  shocked  at  the  disparity  of  his 
situation  with  the  genius  of  the  man.  His  life  was  a 
succession  of  struggles,  vexations,  and  disappointments, 
yet  of  success  in  his  writings.  Smollett,  who  is  a  gnat 
poet,  though  he  has  written  little  in  verse,  and  whose 
rich  genitis  composed  the  most  original  pictures  of 
human  life,  was  compelled  by  his  wants  to  debase  his 
name  by  selling  it  to  voyages  and  translations,  which 
he  never  could  have  read.  When  he  had  worn  him- 
self down  in  the  service  of  the  public  or  the  booksellers, 
there  remained  not,  of  all  his  slender  remunerations, 
in  the  last  stage  of  life,  sufficient  to  convey  him  to  a 
cheap  country  and  a  restorative  air  on  the  Continent. 
The  father  may  have  thought  himself  fortunate,  that 
the  daughter  whom  he  loved  with  more  than  common 
affection  was  no  more  to  share  in  his  wants;  but  the 
husband  had  by  his  side  the  faithful  companion  of  his 
life,  left  without  a  wreck  of  fortune.  Smollett,  gradually 
perishing  in  a  foreign  land,*  neglected  by  an  admiring 
public,  and  without  fresh  resources  from  the  booksell- 
ers, who  were  receiving  the  income  of  his  works,  threw 
out  his  injured  feelings  in  the  character  of  Bramble; 
the  warm  generosity  of  his  temper,  but  not  his  genius, 
seemed  fleeting  with  his  breath.  In  a  foreign  land  his 
widow  marked  by  a  plain  monument   the   spot  of  his 

*  Smollett  died  in  a  small  abode  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Lesrhorn 
where  he  had  resided  some  time  in  the  hope  of  recovering  his  shat- 
tered health;  and  where  he  wrote  his  "Humphrey  Clinker."  His 
friends  had  tried  in  vain  to  procure  for  him  the  appointment  of  consul 
to  any  one  of  the  ports  of  the  Mediterranean.  He  is  buried  in  tho 
English  cemetery  at  Leghorn. — Ed. 


24  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTITORS. 

burial,  and  she  perished  in  solitude !  Yet  Smollett  dead 
— soon  an  ornamented  column  is  raised  at  the  place  of 
his  birth,*  while  the  grave  of  the  author  seemed  to  mul- 
tiply the  editions  of  his  works.  There  are  indeed  grate- 
ful feelings  in  the  puhlic  at  large  for  a  favourite  author; 
but  the  awful  testimony  of  those  feelings,  by  its  gradual 
progress,  must  appear  beyond  the  grave!  They  visit 
the  column  consecrated  by  his  name,  and  his  features 
are  most  loved,  most  venerated,  in  the  bust. 

Smollett  himself  shall  be  the  historian  of  his  own  heart ; 
this  most  successful  "Author  by  Profession,"  who,  for 
his  subsistence,  composed  masterworks  of  genius,  and 
drudged  in  the  toils  of  slavery,  shall  himself  tell  us 
what  happened,  and  describe  that  state  between  life 
and  death,  partaking  of  both,  which  obscured  his  facul- 
ties and  sickened  his  lofty  spirit. 

"Had  some  of  those  who  were  pleased  to  call  them- 
selves my  friends  been  at  any  pains  to  deserve  the  char- 
acter, and  told  me  ingenuously  what  I  had  to  expect 
in  the  capacity  of  an  author,  when  I  first  professed  my- 
self of  that  venerable  fraternity,  I  should  in  all  prob- 
ability have  spared  myself  the  incredible  labour  and 
chagrin  I  have  since  undergone." 

As  a  relief  from  literary  labour,  Smollett  once  went 
to    revisit    bis   family,  and   to  embrace  the   mother   he 

*  It  stands  opposite  Dalquhura  Ilouse,  where  he  was  bom,  near  the 

village  of  Benton,  Dumbartonshire.     Had  Smollett   lived  a  few  more 

he  would  have  been  entitled  to  an  estate  of  about  1000*  a  rear 

There  is  also  a  cenotaph  to  his  memory  on  the  banks  of  Leven-water, 

which  he  has  consecrated  iu  one  of  his  best  poems. Ed. 


AUTHORS   BY   PROFESSION.  25 

loved  ;  but  such  was  the  irritation  of  his  mind  and  the 
infirmity  of  his  health,  exhausted  by  the  hard  labours 
of  authorship,  that  he  never  passed  a  more  weary  sum- 
mer, nor  ever  found  himself  so  incapable  of  indulging 
the  wannest  emotions  of  his  heart.  On  his  return,  in  a 
letter,  he  gave  this  melancholy  narrative  of  himself: — 
"Between  friends,  I  am  now  convinced  that  my  brain 
was  in  some  measure  affected;  for  I  had  a  kind  of  Coma 
Vigil  upon  me  from  April  to  November,  without  inter- 
mission. In  consideration  of  this  circumstance,  I  know 
you  will  forgive  all  my  peevishness  and  discontent;  tell 
Mrs.  Moore  that  with  regard  to  me,  she  has  as  yet  seen 
nothing  but  the  wrong  side  of  the  tapestry."  Thus  it 
happens  in  the  life  of  authors,  that  they  whose  comic 
genius  diffuses  cheerfulness,  create  a  pleasure  which  they 
cannot  themselves  participate. 

The  Coma  Vigil  may  be  described  by  a  verse  of 
Shakspeare  : — 

Still- waking  sleep!  that  is  not  what  it  is  I 

Of  praise  and  censure,  says  Smollett,  in  a  letter  to  Dr. 
Moore,  "  Indeed  I  am  sick  of  both,  and  wish  to  God  my 
circumstances  would  allow  me  to  consign  my  pen  to  ob- 
livion." AAvish,as  fervently  repeated  by  many  "Authors 
by  Profession,"  who  are  not  so  fully  entitled  as  Avas 
Smollett  to  write  when  he  chose,  or  to  have  lived  in  quiet 
for  what  he  had  written.  An  author's  life  is  therefore 
too  often  deprived  of  all  social  comfort  whether  he  be 
the  writer  for  a  minister,  or  a  bookseller — but  their  case 
requires  to  be  stated. 


26  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

THE   CASE   OF  AUTHORS   STATED, 

INCLUDING   THE    HISTORY    OF    LITERARY   TROPERTY. 

TOHNSON  has  dignified  the  booksellers  as  "the 
^  patrons  of  literature,"  which  was  generous  in  that 
great  author,  who  had  written  well  and  lived  but  ill  all 
his  life  on  that  patronage.  Eminent  booksellers,  in  their 
constant  intercourse  with  the  most  enlightened  class  of 
the  community,  that  is,  with  the  best  authors  and  the 
best  readers,  partake  of  the  intelligence  around  them  ; 
their  great  capitals,  too,  are  productive  of  good  and  evil 
in  literature;  useful  when  they  carry  on  great  works,  and 
pernicious  when  they  sanction  indifferent  ones.  Yet  are 
they  but  commercial  men.  A  trader  can  never  be 
deemed  a  patron,  for  it  would  be  romantic  to  purchase 
what  is  not  saleable;  and  where  no  favour  is  conferred, 
there  is  no  patronage. 

Authors  continue  poor,  and  booksellers  become  opu- 
lent ;  an  extraordinary  result!  Booksellers  are  not 
agents  for  authors,  but  proprietors  of  their  works  ;  so 
that  tlic  perpetual  revenues  of  literature  are  solely  in  the 
possession  of  the  trade. 

la  it  then  wonderful  that  even  successful  authors  are 
indigent?  They  are  heira  to  fortunes,  but  by  a  strange 
singularity  they  are  disinherited  at  their  birth;  for,  on  the- 
publication  of  their  works,  these  cease  to  be  their  own 
property.  Let  that  natural  property  be  secured,  and  a 
good  book  would  be  an  inheritance,  a  leasehold  or  a  free- 
hold, av  you  choose  it ;  it  mighl  at  hast  last  out  a  genera- 
tion, and  descend  to  the  author's  blood,  were  they  permit- 


THE   CASE    OF   AUTHORS   STATED.  27 

ted  to  live  on  their  father's  glory,  as  in  all  other  property 
they  do  on  his  industry.*  Something  of  this  nature  lias 
been  instituted  in  France,  where  the  descendants  of 
Corneille  and  Moliere  retain  a  claim  on  the  theatres 
whenever  the  dramas  of  their  great  ancestors  are  per- 
formed. In  that  country,  literature  has  ever  received 
peculiar  honours — it  was  there  decreed,  in  the  affair  of 
Crebillon,  that  literary  productions  are  not  seizable  by 
creditors.f 

The  history  of  literary  property  in  this  country  might 

*  The  following  facts  will  show  the  value  of  literary  property ;  im- 
mense profits  and  cheap  purchases  1  The  manuscript  of  "  Robinson 
Crusoe  "  ran  through  the  whole  trade,  and  no  one  would  print  it ;  the 
bookseller  who  did  purchase  it,  who,  it  is  said,  was  not  remarkable 
for  his  discernment,  but  for  a  speculative  turn,  got  a  thousand  guineas 
by  it.  How  many  have  the  booksellers  since  accumulated  ?  Burn's 
"  Justice  "  was  disposed  of  by  its  author  for  a  trifle,  as  well  as 
Buchan's  "Domestic  Medicine;"  these  works  yield  annual  incomes. 
Goldsmith's  "  Vicar  of  Wakefield  "  was  sold  in  the  hour  of  distress, 
with  little  distinction  from  any  other  work  in  that  class  of  composition ; 
and  "Evelina"  produced  five  guineas  from  the  niggardly  trader. 
Dr.  Johnson  fixed  the  price  of  his  "Biography  of  the  Poets"  at  two 
hundred  guineas ;  and  Mr.  Malone  observes,  the  booksellers  in  the 
course  of  twenty-five  years  have  probably  got  five  thousand.  T  could 
add  a  great  number  of  facts  of  this  nature  which  relate  to  living  wri 
ters ;  the  profits  of  their  own  works  for  two  or  three  years  would 
rescue  them  from  the  horrors  and  humiliation  of  pauperism.  It  is, 
perhaps,  useful  to  record,  that,  while  the  compositions  of  genius  are  but 
slightly  remunerated,  though  sometimes  as  productive  as  "the  house- 
hold stuff"  of  literature,  the  latter  is  rewarded  with  princely  magnifi- 
cence. At  the  sale  of  the  Robinsons,  the  copyright  of  "  Yyse's  Spelling- 
book"  was  sold  at  the  enormous  price  of  2200Z.,  with  an  annuity  cf 
fifty  guineas  to  the  author ! 

f  The  circumstance,  with  the  poet's  dignified  petition,  and  the 
King's  honourable  decree,  are  preserved  in  "  Curiosities  of  Literature." 
VOL  i.  p.  406. 


Og  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

form  as  ludicrous  a  narrative  as  Lucian's  "  true  history." 
It  was  a  long  while  doubtful  whether  any  such  thing  ex- 
isted,  at  the  very  time  when  booksellers  were  assigning 
over  the  perpetual  copyrights  of  books,  and  making  them 
the  subject  of  family  settlements  for  the  provision  of  their 
wives  and  children  !  "When  Tonson.  in  1730,  obtained  an 
injunction  to  restrain  another  bookseller  from  printing 
Milton's  "  Paradise  Lost,"  he  brought  into  court  as  a 
proof  of  his  title  an  assignment  of  the  original  copyright, 
made  over  by  the  sublime  poet  in  1GG7,  which  was  read. 
Milton  received  for  this  assignment  the  sum  which  Ave  all 
know — Tonson  and  all  his  family  and  assignees  rode 
in  their  carriages  with  the  profits  of  the  five-pound 
epic* 

The  verbal  and  tasteless  huvyers,  not  many  years  past, 

*  The  elder  Tonson's  portrait  represents  him  in  his  gown  and  cap, 
holding  in  his  right  hand  a  volume  lettered  "Paradise  Lost " — such  a 
favourite  object  was  Milton  and  copyright!  Jacob  Tonson  was  the 
founder  of  a  race  who  long  honoured  literature.  His  rise  in  life  is 
curious.  He  was  at  first  unable  to  pay  twenty  pounds  for  a  play  by 
Dryden,  and  joined  with  another  bookseller  to  advance  that  sum  ;  the 

-old,  and  Tonson  -was  afterwards  enabled  to  j  urchase  the  suc- 
ceeding ones.  He  and  his  nephew  died  -worth  two  hundred  thousand 
pounds. — Mucli  old  Tonson  owed  to  his  own  industry;  but  he  was  a 
mere  trader.  He  and  Dryden  had  frequent  bickerings  ;  he  insisted  on 
1 0. 000  versos  for  two  hundred  and  sixty-eight  pounds,  and 

Dryden  threw  in  the  finest  Ode  in  the  language  towards  the 
number.  He  would  pay  in  the  base  coin  which  was  then  current; 
which  was  a  loss  to  the  poet.     Tonson  once  complained  to  Dryden, 

!.e  had  only  received  1440  lines  of  his  translation  of  Ovid  for  his 

■llany  for  fifty  guineas,  when  lie  had  calculated  at  the  rate  of 
■  lines  for  forty  guineas  ;  lie  gives  the  poet  a  piece  of  critical  rea- 
soning, that  he  considered  he  had  a  better  bargain  with  ''Juvenal," 
not  so  easy  to  translate  as  Ovid."  In  these  times 
such  a  mere  trader  iu  literature  has  disoj  peared. 


TIIE    CASE    OF    AUTHOHS    STATED.  OQ 

with  legal  metaphysics,  wrangled  like  the  schoolmen,  in- 
quiring of  each  other,  "whether  the  style  and  ideas  of  an 
author  were  tangible  things  ;  or  if  these  were  a  property, 
how  is  possession  to  be  taken,  or  any  act  of  occupancy 
made  on  mere  intellectual  ideas.''''  Nothing,  said  they, 
can  be  an  object  of  property  but  which  has  a  corporeal 
substance  ;  the  air  and  the  light,  to  which  they  compared 
an  author's  ideas,  are  common  to  all ;  ideas  in  the  MS. 
state  were  compared  to  birds  in  a  cage ;  while  the  author 
confines  them  in  his  own  dominion,  none  but  he  has  a 
right  to  let  them  fly ;  but  the  moment  he  allows  the  bird 
to  escape  from  his  hand,  it  is  no  violation  of  property  in 
any  one  to  make  it  his  own.  And  to  prove  that  there 
existed  no  property  after  publication,  they  found  an  an- 
alogy in  the  gathering  of  acorns,  or  in  seizing  on  a  vacant 
piece  of  ground ;  and  thus  degrading  that  most  refined 
piece  of  art  formed  in  the  highest  state  of  society,  a  lit- 
erary production,  they  brought  us  back  to  a  state  of 
nature ;  and  seem  to  have  concluded  that  literary  prop- 
erty was  purely  ideal ;  a  phantom  which,  as  its  author 
could  neither  grasp  nor  confine  to  himself,  he  must  en- 
tirely depend  on  the  public  benevolence  for  his  reward.  * 
The  Ideas,  that  is,  the  work  of  an  author,  are  "  tangi- 
ble things."  "  There  are  works,"  to  quote  the  words  of 
a  near  and  dear  relative,  "  which  require  great  learning, 
great  industry,  great  labour,  and  great  capital,  in  their 
preparation.  They  assume  a  palpable  form.  You  may 
fill  warehouses  with  them,  and  freight  ships ;  and  the 

*  Sir  James  Burrows'  Reports  on  the  question  concerning  Literary 
Property,  4to.     London,  1773. 


30  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

tenure  by  which  they  are  held  is  superior  to  that  of  all 
other  property,  for  it  is  original.  It  is  tenure  which  does 
not  exist  in  a  doubtful  title;  which  docs  not  spring  from 
any  adventitious  circumstances;  it  is  not  found — it  is  not 
purchased — it  is  not  prescriptive — it  is  original ;  so  it  is 
the  most  natural  of  all  titles,  because  it  is  the  most  sim- 
ple and  least  artificial.  It  is  paramount  and  sovereign, 
because  it  is  a  tenure  by  creation."* 

There  were  indeed  some  more  generous  spirits  and 
better  philosophers  fortunately  found  on  the  same  bench; 
and  the  identity  of  a  literary  composition  was  resolved 
into  its  sentiments  and  language,  besides  what  was  more 
obviously  valuable  to  some  persons,  the  print  and  paper. 
On  this  slight  principle  was  issued  the  profound  award 
which  accorded  a  certain  term  of  years  to  any  work, 
however  immortal.  They  could  not  diminish  the  immor- 
tality of  a  book,  but  only  its  reward.  In  all  the  litiga- 
tions respecting  literary  property,  authors  were  little 
considered — except  some  honourable  testimonies  due  to 
genius,  from  the  sense  of  Willes,  and  the  eloquence  of 
Mansfield.  Literary  property  was  still  disputed,  like  the 
rights  of  a  parish  common.  An  honest  printer,  who 
could  not  always  write  grammar,  had  the  shrewdness  to 
make  a  bold  effort  in  this  scramble,  and  perceiving  that 
even  by  this  last  favourable  award  all  literary  property 
would  necessarily  centre  with  the  booksellers,  now  stood 
forward  for  his  own  body — the  printers.  This  rough 
advocate  observed  that  "a  few  persons  who  call  them- 

*  Mirror  of  Parliament,  3529. 


THE    CASE    OF   AUTHORS    STATED.  31 

selves  booksellers,  about  the  number  of  twenty-jive,  have 
kept  the  monopoly  of  books  and  copies  in  their  hands,  to 
the  entire  exclusion  of  all  others,  but  more  especially  the 
printers,  whom  they  have  always  held  it  a  rule  never  to 
let  become  purchasers  in  copy?''  Not  a  word  for  the 
authors!  As  for  them,  they  were  doomed  by  both 
parties  as  the  fat  oblation :  they  indeed  sent  forth  some 
meek  bleatings  ;  but  what  were  authors,  between  judges, 
booksellers,  and  printers  ?  the  sacrificed  among  the 
sacrificers ! 

All  this  was  reasoning  in  a  circle.  Literary  prop 
eety  in  our  nation  arose  from  a  new  state  of  society. 
These  lawyers  could  never  develope  its  nature  by  wild 
analogies,  nor  discover  it  in  any  common-law  right ; 
for  our  common  law,  composed  of  immemorial  customs, 
could  never  have  had  in  its  contemplation  an  object 
which  could  not  have  existed  in  barbarous  periods. 
Literature,  in  its  enlarged  spirit,  certainly  never  entered 
into  the  thoughts  or  attention  of  our  rude  ancestors. 
All  their  views  were  bounded  by  the  necessaries  of  life ; 
and  as  yet  they  had  no  conception  of  the  impalpable, 
invisible,  yet  sovereign  dominion  of  the  human  mind — 
enough  for  our  rough  heroes  was  that  of  the  seas ! 
Before  the  reign  of  Henry  VIII.  great  authors  composed 
occasionally  a  book  in  Latin,  which  none  but  other 
great  authors  cared  for,  and  which  the  people  could  not 
read.  In  the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  Roger  Ascham  ap- 
peared— one  of  those  men  of  genius  born  to  create  a 
new  era  in  the  history  of  their  nation.  The  first  Eng- 
lish author  who  may  be  regarded  as  the  founder  of  oui 


32  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

prose  style  was  Roger  Aschnm,  the  venerable  parent  of 
our  n<<ti\:e  literature.  At  a  time  when  our  scholars 
affected  to  contemn  the  vernacular  idiom,  and  in  their 
Latin  works  were  losing  their  better  fame,  that  of  being 
understood  by  all  their  countrymen,  Ascham  boldly- 
avowed   the   design  of  setting   an   example,  in   his  own 

WOrds,    TO     SPEAK    AS     THE     COMMOX     PEOPLE,    TO     THINK 

as  wise  mkx,  His  pristine  English  is  still  forcible 
without  pedantry,  and  still  beautiful  without  ornament.* 
The  illustrious  Bacon  condescended  to  follow  this  new 
example  in  the  most  popular  of  his  works.  This  change 
in  our  literature  was  like  a  revelation ;  these  men 
taught  us  our  language  in  books.  We  became  a  read- 
ing people  ;  and  then  the  demand  for  books  naturally 
produced  a  new  order  of  authors,  who  traded  in  liter- 
ature. It  was  then,  so  early  as  in  the  Elizabethan  age, 
that  literary  property  may  be  said  to  derive  its  obscure 
origin  in  this  nation.  It  was  protected  in  an  indirect 
manner  by  the  licensers  of  the  press ;  for  although  that 
was  a  mere  political  institution,  only  designed  to  prevent 
seditious  and  irreligious  publications,  yet,  as  no  book 
could  be  printed  without  a  licence,  there  was  honour 
enough  in  the  licensers  not  to  allow  other  publishers  to 
infringe  on  the  privilege  granted  to  the  first  claimant. 
In  Queen  Anne's  time,  when  the  office  of  licensers  was 
extinguished,  a  more  liberal  genius  was  rising  in  the 
notion,  and  literary  property  received  a  more  definite 
and  a  more  powerful   protection.     A  limited  term  was 

*  See  "  Amenities  of  Literature  "  for  an  account  of  this  author. 


THE    CASE    OP    AUTHORS    STATED.  33 

granted  to  every  author  to  reap  the  fruits  of  his  labours ; 
and  Lord  Hardwicke  pronounced  this  statute  "a  uni- 
versal patent  for  authors."  Yet,  subsequently,  the 
subject  of  literary  property  involved  discussion ;  even 
at  so  late  a  period  as  in  1769  it  was  still  to  be  litigated. 
It  was  then  granted  that  originally  an  author  had  at 
common  law  a  property  in  his  work,  but  that  the  act  of 
Anne  took  away  all  copyright  after  the  expiration  of 
the  terms  it  permitted. 

As  the  matter  now  stands,  let  us  address  an  arith- 
metical age — but  my  pen  hesitates  to  bring  down  my 
subject  to  an  argument  fitted  to  "these  coster-monger 
times."*  On  the  present  principle  of  literary  property, 
it  results  that  an  author  disposes  of  a  leasehold  property 
of  twenty-eight  years,  often  for  less  than  the  price  of 
one  year's  purchase  !  How  many  living  authors  are  the 
sad  witnesses  of  this  fact,  who  like  so  many  Esaus, 
have  sold  their  inheritance  for  a  meal !  I  leave  the  whole 
school  of  Adam  Smith  to  calm  their  calculating  emotions 
concerning  "  that  unprosperous  race  of  men "  (some- 
times this  master-seer  calls  them  "unproductive") 
"  commonly  called  men  of  letters"  who  are  pretty  much 
in  the  situation  which  lawyers  and  physicians  would  be 
in,  were  these,  as  he  tells  us,  in  that  state  when  "  a 
scholar  and  a  beggar  seem  to  have  been  very  nearly 
synonymous  terms  " — and  this  melancholy  fact  that  man 

*  A  coster-monger,  or  Costard-monger,  is  a  dealer  in  apples,  which 
are  so  called  because  they  are  shaped  like  a  costard,  i.  e.  a  man's 
head.  Steevens. — Johnson  explains  the  phrase  eloquently:  "In  thesa 
times  when  the  prevalence  of  trade  has  produced  that  meanness, 
that  rates  the  merit  of  everything  by  money." 
3 


34  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

of  genius  discovered,  without  the  feather  of  his  pen 
brushing  away  a  tear  from  his  lid — without  one  spon- 
taneous and  indignant  groan  ! 

Authors  may  exclaim,  "we  ask  for  justice,  not 
charity."  They  would  not  need  to  require  any  favour, 
nor  claim  any  other  than  that  protection  which  an 
enlightened  government,  in  its  wisdom  and  its  justice, 
must  bestow.  They  would  leave  to  the  public  disposi- 
tion the  sole  appreciation  of  their  works;  their  book 
must  make  its  own  fortune;  a  bad  work  may  be  cried 
up,  and  a  good  work  may  be  cried  down;  but  Faction 
will  soon  lose  its  voice,  and  Truth  acquire  one.  The 
cause  we  are  pleading  is  not  the  calamities  of  indifferent 
writers,  but  of  those  whose  utility  or  whose  genius  long 
survives  that  limited  term  which  has  been  so  hardly 
wrenched  from  the  penurious  hand  of  verbal  lawyers. 
Every  lover  of  literature,  and  every  votary  of  humanity 
has  long  felt  indignant  at  that  sordid  state  and  all  those 
secret  sorrows  to  which  men  of  the  finest  genius,  or  of 
sublime  industry,  are  reduced  and  degraded  in  society 
Johnson  himself,  who  rejected  that  perpetuity  of  literary 
property  which  some  enthusiasts  seemed  to  claim  at  the 
time  the  subjeel  was  undergoing  the  discussion  of  the 
judges,  is,  however,  for  extending  the  copyright  to  a 
cerdury.  Could  authors  secure  this,  their  natural  right, 
literal  lire  would  acquire  a  permanent  and  a  nobler 
reward  ;  for  greal  authors  would  then  be  distinguished 
by  the  very  profits  they  would  receive  from  thai  obscure 
multitude  whose  common  disgraces  they  frequently  par- 
ticipate,  notwithstanding   the  superiority  of  their  own 


THE    CASE    OF   AUTIIORS    STATED.  35 

genius.  Johnson  himself  will  serve  as  a  proof  of  the 
incompetent  remuneration  of  literary  property.  He 
undertook  and  he  performed  an  Herculean  labour,  which 
employed  him  so  many  years  that  the  pi'ice  he  obtained 
was  exhausted  before  the  work  was  concluded — the 
wages  did  not  even  last  as  long  as  the  labour  !  Where, 
then,  is  the  author  to  look  forward,  when  such  works 
are  undertaken,  for  a  provision  for  his  family,  or  for 
his  future  existence?  It  would  naturally  arise  from 
the  work  itself,  were  authors  not  the  most  ill-treated 
and  oppressed  class  of  the  community.  The  daughter 
of  Milton  need  not  have  craved  the  alms  of  the  ad- 
mirers of  her  father,  if  the  right  of  authors  had  been 
better  protected;  his  own  "Paradise  Lost"  had  then 
been  her  better  portion  and  her  most  honourable  in- 
heritance. The  children  of  Burns  would  have  required 
no  subscriptions  ;  that  annual  tribute  which  the  public 
pay  to  the  genius  of  their  parent  was  their  due,  and 
would  have  been  their  fortune. 

Authors  now  submit  to  have  a  shorter  life  than  their 
own  celebrity.  While  the  book  markets  of  Europe  are 
supplied  with  the  writings  of  English  authors,  and  they 
have  a  wider  diffusion  in  America  than  at  home,  it 
seems  a  national  ingratitude  to  limit  the  existence  of 
works  for  their  authors  to  a  short  number  of  years,  and 
then  to  seize  on  their  possession  for  ever. 


36  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTTIOR& 

THE  SUFFERINGS   OF  AUTHORS. 

rr^IIE  natural  rig  Jits  and  properties  of  autiioks  not 
-*-  having  been  sufficiently  protected,  they  are  de- 
frauded, not  indeed  of  their  fame,  though  they  may  not 
always  live  to  witness  it,  but  of  their  imintemtptcd 
profits,  which  might  save  them  from  their  frequent 
degradation  in  society.  That  act  of  Anne  which  con- 
fers on  them  some  right  of  property,  acknowledges 
that  works  of  learned  men  have  been  carried  on  "  too 
often  to  the  ruin  of  them  and  their  families." 

Hence  we  trace  a  literary  calamity  which  the  public 
endure  in  those  "Authors  by  Profession,"  who,  finding 
often  too  late  in  life  that  it  is  the  worst  profession,  are 
not  scrupulous  to  live  by  some  means  or  other.  "  I 
must  live,"  cried  one  of  the  brotherhood,  shrugging  his 
shoulders  in  his  misery,  and  almost  blushing  for  a  libel 
he  had  just  printed — "I  do  not  see  the  necessity," 
was  the  dignified  reply.  Trade  was  certainly  not  the 
origin  of  authorship.  Most  of  our  great  authors  have 
written  from  a  more  impetuous  impulse  than  that  of  a 
mechanic;  urged  by  a  loftier  motive  than  that  of 
humouring  the  popular  taste,  they  have  not  lowered 
themselves  by  writing  down  to  the  public,  but  have 
raised  the  public  to  them.  I'ntasked,  they  composed 
at  propitious  intervals;  and  feeling,  not  labour,  was  in 
their  last,  as  in  their  first  page. 

When  we  became  a  reading  people,  books  were  to  be 
suited  to  popular  tastes,  and  then  that  trade  was  opened 
that  leads  to  the  workhouse.     A  new  race  sprang  up, 


THE    SUFFERINGS    OF    AUTHORS.  37 

that,  like  Ascham,  "  spoke  as  the  common  people  ;"  but 
would  not,  like  Ascham,  "  think  as  wise  men."  The 
founders  of  "Authors  by  Profession"  appear  as  far 
back  as  in  the  Elizabethan  age.  Then  there  were  some 
roguish  wits,  who,  taking  advantage  of  the  public 
humour,  and  yielding  their  principle  to  their  pen,  lived 
to  write,  and  wrote  to  live ;  loose  livers  and  loose 
writers ! — like  Autolycus,  they  ran  to  the  fair,  with 
baskets  of  hasty  manufactures,  fit  for  clowns  and 
maidens.* 

Even  then  flourished  the  craft  of  authorship,  and  the 
mysteries  of  bookselling.  Robert  Greene,  the  master- 
wit,  wrote  "  The  Art  of  Coney-catching,"  or  Cheatery, 
in  which  he  was  an  adept ;  he  died  of  a  surfeit  of 
Rhenish  and  pickled  herrings,  at  a  fatal  banquet  of 
authors  ; — and  left  as  his  legacy  among  the  "  Authors  by 
Profession "  "  A  Groatsworth  of  Wit,  bought  with  a 
Million  of  Repentance."  One  died  of  another  kind  of 
surfeit.  Another  was  assassinated  in  a  brothel.  But  the 
list  of  the  calamities  of  all  these  worthies  have  as  great 
variety  as  those  of  the  Seven  Champions.f     Nor  were 

*  An  abundance  of  these  amusing;  tracts  eagerly  bought  up  in  their 
day,  but  which  came  in  the  following;  generation  to  the  ballad-stalls, 
are  in  the  present  enshrined  in  the  cabinets  of  the  curious.  Such 
are  the  revolutions  of  literature  1  [It  is  by  no  means  uncommon  to 
find  them  realise  sums  at  the  rate  of  a  guinea  a  page  ;  but  it  is  to  be 
solely  attributed  to  their  extreme  rarity;  for  in  many  instances  tho 
reprints  of  such  tracts  are  worthless  ] 

f  Poverty  and  the  gaol  alternated  with  tavern  carouses  or  the  place 
of  honour  among  the  wild  young  gallants  of  the  playhouses.  They 
were  gentlemen  or  beggars  as  daily  circumstances  ordained.  When 
this  was  the  case  with  such  authors  ag  Greene.  Peele,  and  Massinger, 


3?  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

the  stationers,  or  book-venders,  as  the  publishers  of  books 
were  first  designated,  at  a  fault  in  the  mysteries  of 
"  coney-catching."  Deceptive  and  vaunting  title-pages 
were  practised  to  such  excess,  that  Tom  Nash,  an 
"Author  by  Profession,"  never  fastidiously  modest, 
blushed  at  the  title  of  his  "  Pierce  Pennilesse,"  which 
the  publisher  had  flourished  in  the  first  edition,  like  "  a 
tedious  mountebank."  The  booksellers  forged  great 
names  to  recommend  their  works,  and  passed  off  in  cur- 
rency their  base  metal  stamped  with  a  royal  head.  "  It 
was  an  usual  thing  in  those  days,"  says  honest  Anthony 
Wood,  "  to  set  a  great  name  to  a  book  or  books,  by  the 
sharking  booksellers  or  snivelling  writers,  to  get  bread." 
Such  authors  as  these  are  unfortunate,  before  they  are 
criminal ;  they  often  tire  out  their  youth  before  they 
discover  that  "  Author  by  Profession  "  is  a  denomination 
ridiculously  assumed,  for  it  is  none  !  The  first  efforts  of 
men  of  genius  are  usually  honourable  ones ;  but  too 
often  they  suffer  that  genius  to  be  debased.  Many  who 
would  have  composed  history  have  turned  voluminous 

•we  need  not  wonder  at  finding  "  a  whole  knot"  of  writers  in  infinitely 
worse  plight,  who  lived  (or  starved)  by  writing  bal'ads  and  pamphlets 
on  temporary  subjects.  In  a  brief  tract,  called  "The  Downfall  of 
Temporising  Poets,"  published  1641,  they  are  said  to  be  "an  indiffer- 
ent strong  corporation,  twenty-three  of  you  sufficient  writers,  besides 
Martin  Parker,"  who  was  the  great  ballad  and  pamphlet  writer  of  the 
day.  The  shifts  they  were  put  to,  and  the  difficulties  of  their  living, 
is  denoted  in  the  reply  of  one  of  the  characters  in  this  tract,  who  on 
being  asked  if  he  has  money,  replies  "  Money  ?  I  wonder  where  you 
evf-r  see  poets  have  money  two  days  together  ;  I  sold  a  copy  last  I 
and  have  spent  the  money ;  and  now  have  another  copy  to  spl  but 
nobody  will  buy  it." — Ed. 


THE    SUFFERINGS   OF    AUTHORS.  39 

party-writers  ;  many  a  noble  satirist  has  become  a  hungry 
libeller.  Men  who  are  starved  in  society,  hold  to  it  but 
loosely.  They  are  the  children  of  Nemesis  !  they  avenge 
themselves — and  with  the  Satan  of  Milton  they  exclaim, 

Evil,  be  thou  my  good  I 

Never  were  their  feelings  more  vehemently  echoed 
than  by  this  Nash — the  creature  of  genius,  of  famine, 
and  despair.  He  lived  indeed  in  the  age  of  Elizabeth, 
but  writes  as  if  he  had  lived  in  our  own.  He  proclaimed 
himself  to  the  world  as  Pierce  Pennilesse,  and  on  a  retro- 
spect of  his  literary  life,  observes  that  he  had  "  sat  up  late 
and  rose  early,  contended  with  the  cold,  and  conversed 
with  scarcitie ;"  he  says,  "  all  my  labours  turned  to  losse, 
— I  was  despised  and  neglected,  my  painesnot  regarded, 
or  slightly  rewarded,  and  I  myself,  in  prime  of  my  best 
wit,  laid  open  to  povertie.  Whereupon  I  accused  my 
fortune,  railed  on  my  patrons,  bit  my  pen,  rent  my 
papers,  and  raged." — And  then  comes  the  after-reflection, 
which  so  frequently  provokes  the  anger  of  genius : 
"  How  many  base  men  that  wanted  those  parts  I  had, 
enjoyed  content  at  will,  and  had  wealth  at  command  ! 
I  called  to  mind  a  cobbler  that  was  worth  five  hundred 
pounds ;  an  hostler  that  had  built  a  goodly  inn ;  a  car- 
man in  a  leather  pilche  that  had  whipt  a  thousand  pound 
out  of  his  horse's  tail — and  have  I  more  than  these? 
thought  I  to  myself;  am  I  better  born?  am  I  better 
brought  up  ?  yea,  and  better  favoured  !  and  yet  am  I  a 
beggar?  How  am  I  crost,  or  whence  is  this  ciu-se? 
Even  from  hence,  the  men  that  should  employ  such  as  1 


40  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

am,  are  enamoured  of  their  own  wits,  though  they  be 
never  so  scurvie  ;  that  a  scrivener  is  better  paid  than  a 
scholar;  and  men  of  art  must  seek  to  live  among  cor- 
morants, or  be  kept  under  by  dunces,  who  count  it  policy 
to  keep  them  bare  to  follow  their  books  the  better." 
And  then,  Nash  thus  utters  the  cries  of — ■ 

A   DESPAIRING   AUTHOR! 

Why  is't  damnation  to  despair  and  die 

When  life  is  my  true  happiness'  disease  ? 
My  soul!  my  soul!  thy  safety  makes  me  fly 

The  faulty  means  that  might  my  pain  appease; 
Divines  and  dying  men  may  talk  of  hell; 
But  in  my  heart  her  several  torments  dwelL 

Ah  worthless  wit,  to  train  me  to  this  woe! 

Deceitful  arts  that  nourish  discontent! 
I'll  thrive  the  folly  that  bewitch'd  me  so! 

Vain  thoughts,  adieu!  for  now  I  will  repent; 
And  yet  my  wants  persuade  me  to  proceed, 
Since  none  take  pity  of  a  scholar's  need ! — 

Forgive  me,  God,  although  I  curse  my  birth, 
And  ban  the  air  wherein  I  breathe  a  wretch  I 

For  misery  hath  daunted  all  my  mirth — 

Without  redress  complains  my  careless  verse, 
And  Midas'  ears  relent  not  at  my  moan! 

In  some  far  land  will  I  my  griefs  rehearse, 

'Mongst  them  that  will  be  moved  when  I  shall  groan  I 

England,  adieu  !  the  soil  that  brought  me  forth  1 

Adieu,  unkinde  !  where  skill  is  nothing  worth! 

Such  was  the  miserable  cry  of  an  "  Author  by  Profes- 
sion" in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth.  Xash  not  only  re- 
nounces his  country  in  his  despair — and  hesitates  on 
"the  faulty  means  "  which  have  appeased  the  pangs  of 
many  of  his  unhappy  brothers,  but  he  proves   also  the 


A   MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  41 

weakness  of  the  moral  principle  among  these  men  of 
genius ;  for  he  promises,  if  any  Maecenas  will  bind  him 
by  his  bounty,  he  will  do  him  "as  much  honour  as  any 
poet  of  my  beardless  years  in  England — but,"  he  adds, 
"  if  he  be  sent  away  with  a  flea  in  his  ear,  let  him  look 
that  I  will  rail  on  him  soundly  ;  not  for  an  hour  or  a 
day,  while  the  injury  is  fresh  in  my  memory,  but  in  some 
elaborate  polished  poem,  which  I  will  leave  to  the  world 
when  I  am  dead,  to  be  a  living  image  to  times  to  come 
of  his  beggarly  parsimony."  Poets  might  imagine  that 
Chatterton  had  written  all  this,  about  the  time  he  struck 
a  balance  of  his  profit  and  loss  by  the  death  of  Beckford 
the  Lord  Mayor,  in  which  he  concludes  with  "I  am 
glad  he  is  dead  by  3l  13s.  6d.n  * 


A  MENDICANT  AUTHOR, 

AND    THE    PATROXS    OF    FORMER   TlilES. 

TT  must  be  confessed,  that  before  "  Authors  by  Pro- 

fession"  had  fallen  into  the  hands  of  the  booksellers, 

they  endured  peculiar  grievances.     They  were  pitiable 

*  Chatterton  had  written  a  political  essay  for  "  The  North  Briton," 
which  opened  with  the  preluding  flourish  of  "  A  spirited  people  free- 
ing themselves  from  insupportable  slavery:"  it  was,  however,  though 
accepted,  not  printed,  on  account  of  the  Lord  Mayor's  death.  The 
patriot  thus  calculated  the  death  of  his  great  patron ! 

£  s.  d. 
Lost  by  his  death  in  this  Essay  .  .  .  1  11  6 
Gained  in  Elegies  .  £2     2 


in  Essays  .  3      3 


5     5     0 


Am  glad  he  is  dead  by        .        .        .        .     £3  13     6 


42  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

retainers  of  some  great  family.  The  miseries  of  such  an 
author,  and  the  insolence  and  penuriousness  of  his  pa- 
trons, who  would  not  return  the  poetry  they  liked  and 
would  not  pay  for,  may  be  traced  in  the  eventful  life  of 
Thomas  Churchyard,  a  poet  of  the  age  of  Elizabeth,  one 
of  those  unfortunate  men  who  have  written  poetry  all 
their  days,  and  lived  a  long  life  to  complete  the  misfor- 
tune. His  muse  was  so  fertile,  that  his  works  pass  all 
enumeration.  lie  courted  numerous  patrons,  who  valued 
the  poetiy,  while  they  left  the  poet  to  his  own  miserable 
contemplations.  In  a  long  catalogue  of  his  works,  which 
this  poet  has  himself  given,  he  adds  a  few  memoranda 
as  he  proceeds,  a  little  ludicrous,  but  very  melancholy. 
He  wrote  a  book  which  he  could  never  afterwards  re- 
cover from  one  of  his  patrons,  and  adds,  "  all  which 
book  was  in  as  good  verse  as  ever  I  made  ;  an  honour- 
able knight  dwelling  in  the  Black  Friers  can  witness 
the  same,  because  I  read  it  unto  him."  Another  ac- 
corded him  the  same  remuneration — on  which  he  adds, 
"An  infinite  number  of  other  songs  and  sonnets  given 
where  they  cannot  be  recovered,  nor  purchase  any 
favour  when  they  are  craved."  Still,  however,  he  an- 
nounces "Twelve  long  Tales  for  Christmas,  dedicated  to 
twelve  honourable  lords."  Well  might  Churchyard 
write  his  own  sad  life  under  the  title  of  "The  Tragicall 
Discourse  of  the  Haplesse  .Alan's  Life."  * 

*  This  author,  now  little  known  but  to  tho  student  of  our  rarer 
earlj'  poets,  was  a  native  of  Shrewsbury,  and  had  served  in  the  army. 
He  wrote  a  large  number  of  poetical  pieces,  all  now  of  the  greatest 
rarity  ;  their  names  have   been  preserved  by  that  industrious  anti- 


A    MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  43 

It  will  not  be  easy  to  parallel  this  pathetic  description 
of  the  wretched  age  of  a  poor  neglected  poet  mourning 
over  a  youth  vainly  spent. 

High  t'me  it  is  to  haste  my  carcase  hence  : 
Youth  stole  away  and  felt  no  kind  of  joy, 
And  age  he  left  in  travail  ever  since; 
The  wanton  days  that  made  me  nice  and  coy 
"Were  but  a  dream,  a  shadow,  and  a  toy — 

I  look  in  glass,  and  find  my  cheeks  so  lean 

That  every  hour  I  do  but  wish  me  dead ; 

Now  back  bends  down,  and  forwards  falls  the  head, 

And  hollow  eyes  in  wrinkled  brow  doth  shroud 

As  though  two  stars  were  creeping  under  cloud. 

The  lips  wax  cold,  and  look  both  pale  and  thin, 

The  teeth  fall  out  as  nutts  forsook  the  shell, 

The  bare  bald  head  but  shows  where  hair  hath  been, 

The  lively  joints  wax  weary,  stiff,  and  still, 

The  ready  tongue  now  falters  in  his  tale ; 

The  courage  quails  as  strength  decays  and  goes.     .     .     . 

The  thatcher  hath  a  cottage  poor  you  see : 

The  shepherd  knows  where  he  shall  sleep  at  night; 

The  daily  drudge  from  cares  can  quiet  be : 

Thus  fortune  sends  some  rest  to  every  wight; 

And  I  was  born  to  house  and  land  by  right.     .    .    . 

quary  Joseph  Ritson,  in  his  Bibliographic/,  Poetica.  The  principal  one 
was  termed  "  The  Worthiness  of  Wales,"  and  is  written  in  laudation 
of  the  Principality.  He  was  frequently  employed  to  supply  verses 
for  Court  Masques  and  Pageantry.  He  composed  "  all  the  devises, 
pastimes,  and  plays  at  Norwich  "  when  Queen  Elizabeth  was  enter- 
tained there  ;  as  well  as  gratulutory  verses  to  her  at  Woodstock.  He 
speaksof  his  mind  as  "never  free  from  studie,"  and  his  body  "seldom 
void  of  toyle  " — "  and  yet  both  of  them  neither  brought  greate  benefits 
to  the  life,  nor  blessing  to  the  soule  "  he  adds,  in  the  words  of  a  man 
whose  hope  deferred  has  made  his  heart  sick  ! — Ed. 


44  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

TTell.  ere  my  breath  my  body  do  forsake 

My  spirit  I  bequeath  to  God  above; 

My  books,  my  scrawls,  and  songs  that  I  did  make, 

I  leave  with  friends  that  freely  did  me  love.     .     .     . 

Now.  friends,  shake  hands.  I  must  be  gone,  my  boys! 

Our  mirth  takes  end,  our  triumph  all  is  done; 

Our  tickling  talk,  our  sports  and  merry  toys 

Do  glide  away  like  shadow  of  the  sun. 

Another  comes  when  I  my  race  have  run, 

Shall  pass  the  time  with  you  in  better  plight, 

And  find  good  cause  of  greater  things  to  write. 

Yet  Churchyard  was  no  contemptible  bard ;  he  com- 
posed a  national  poem,  "  The  Worthiness  of  "Wales," 
which  has  been  reprinted,  and  will  be  still  dear  to  his 
"  Fatherland,"  as  the  Hollanders  expressively  denote 
their  natal  spot.  He  wrote  in  the  "  Alirrour  of  Magis- 
trates," the  Life  of  Wolsey,  -which  has  parts  of  great 
dignity;  and  the  Life  of  Jane  Shore,  which  was  much 
noticed  in  his  day,  for  a  severe  critic  of  the  times  writes: 

Hath  not  Shore's  wife,  although  a  light-skirt  she, 
Given  him  a  chaste,  long,  lasting  memorie? 

Churchyard,  and  the  miseries  of  his  poetical  life,  are 
alluded  to  by  Spenser.  He  is  old  Palemon  in  "Colin 
Clout's  come  Home  again."  Spenser  is  supposed  to 
describe  this  laborious  writer  for  half  a  century,  whose 
melancholy  pipe,  in  his  old  age,  may  make  the  reader 
"rew:" 

Yet  he  himself  may  rewed  be  more  right, 
That  sung  so  long  untill  quite  hoarse  he  grew. 

His  epitaph,  preserved  by  Camden,  is  extremely  in- 
structive to  all  poets,  could  epitaphs  instruct  them : — 


A    MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  45 

Poverty  and  poetry  his  tomb  doth  inclose ; 
Wherefore,  good  neighbours,  be  merry  in  prose. 

It  appears  also  by  a  confession  of  Tom  Nash,  that  an 
author  would  then,  pressed  by  the  res  angusta  domi, 
when  "the  bottom  of  his  purse  was  turned  upward," 
submit  to  compose  pieces  for  gentlemen  who  aspired  to 
authorship.  He  tells  us  on  some  occasion,  that  he  was 
then  in  the  country  composing  poetry  for  some  country 
squire ; — and  says,  "  I  am  faine  to  let  my  plow  stand 
still  in  the  midst  of  a  furrow,  to  follow  these  Senior  Fan- 
tasticos,  to  whose  amorous  villanellas*  I  prostitute  my 
pen,"  and  this,  too,  "twice  or  thrice  in  a  month  ;"  and  ho 
complains  that  it  is  "  poverty  which  alone  maketh  me  so 
unconstant  to  my  determined  studies,  trudging  from  place 
to  place  to  and  fro,  and  prosecuting  the  means  to  keep  me 
from  idlenesse."    An  author  was  then  much  like  a  vagrant. 

Even  at  a  later  period,  in  the  reign  of  the  literary 
James,  great  authors  were  reduced  to  a  state  of  men- 
dicity, and  lived  on  alms,  although  their  lives  and  their 
fortunes  had  been  consumed  in  forming  national  labours. 
The  antiquary  Stowe  exhibits  a  striking  example  of  the 
rewards  conferred  on  such  valued  authors.  Stowe  had 
devoted  his  life,  and  exhausted  his  patrimony,  in  the 
study  of  English  antiquities ;  he  had  travelled  on  foot 
throughout  the  kingdom,  inspecting  all  monuments  of 
antiquity,  and  rescuing  what  he  could  from  the  dispersed 
libraries  of  the  monasteries.     His  stupendous  collections, 

*  Villanellas,  or  rather  "ViHanescas,  are  properly  country  rustic 
Bongs,  but  commonly  taken  for  ingenious  ones  made  in  imitation  of 
them." — Pineda. 


46  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

in  his  own  handwriting,  still  exist,  to  provoke  the  feeble 
industry  of  literary  loiterers.  lie  felt  through  life  the 
enthusiasm  of  study  ;  and  seated  in  his  monkish  library, 
living  with  the  dead  more  than  with  the  living,  he  was 
still  a  student  of  taste:  for  Spenser  the  poet  visited  the 
library  of  Stowe ;  and  the  first  good  edition  of  Chaucer 
was  made  so  chiefly  by  the  labours  of  our  author.  Late 
in  life,  worn-out  with  study  and  the  cares  of  poverty, 
neglected  by  that  proud  metropolis  of  which  he  had 
been  the  historian,  his  good-humour  did  not  desert  him ; 
for  being  afflicted  with  sharp  pains  in  his  aged  feet,  he 
observed  that  "  his  affliction  lay  in  that  part  which  for- 
merly he  had  made  so  much  use  of."  Many  a  mile  had 
he  wandered  and  much  had  he  expended,  for  those  treas- 
ures of  antiquities  which  had  exhausted  his  fortune,  and 
with  which  he  had  formed  works  of  great  public  utility. 
It  was  in  his  eightieth  year  that  Stowe  at  length  re- 
ceived a  public  acknowledgment  of  his  services,  which 
will  appear  to  us  of  a  very  extraordinary  nature.  He 
was  so  reduced  in  his  circumstances  that  he  petitioned 
James  I.  for  a  licence  to  collect  alms  for  himself!  "as  a 
recompense  for  his  labours  and  travel  of forty '-Jive  years, 
in  setting  forth  the  Chronicles  of  England,  and  eight 
yean  taken  up  in  the  Survey  of  the  Cities  of  Lon<l>a. 
and  Westminster,  towards  his  relief  now  in  his  old  age; 
having  left  his  former  means  of  living,  and  only  em- 
ploying himself  for  the  service  and  good  of  his  country." 
Letters-patent  under  the  greal  seal  were  granted.  Alter 
no  penurious  commendations  <>t"  Stowe's  labours,  he  is 
permitted  "to  gather  the  benevolence  of  well-disposed 


A    MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  47 

people  within  this  realm  of  England;  to  ask,  gather,  and 
take  the  alms  of  all  our  loving  subjects."  These  letters- 
patent  were  to  be  published  by  the  clergy  from  their 
pulpits ;  they  produced  so  little,  that  they  were  renewed 
for  another  twelvemonth  :  one  entire  parish  in  the  city 
contributed  seven  shillings  and  sixpence !  Such,  then, 
was  the  patronage  received  by  Stowe,  to  be  a  licensed 
beggar  throughout  the  kingdom  for  one  twelvemonth  ! 
Such  was  the  public  remuneration  of  a  man  who  had 
been  useful  to  his  nation,  but  not  to  himself! 

Such  was  the  first  age  of  Patronage,  which  branched 
out  in  the  last  century  into  an  age  of  Subscriptions, 
when  an  author  levied  contributions  before  his  work 
appeared  ;  a  mode  which  inundated  our  literature  with 
a  great  portion  of  its  worthless  volumes:  of  these  the 
most  remarkable  are  the  splendid  publications  of  Rich- 
ard Blome;  they  may  be  called  fictitious  works;  for 
they  are  only  mutilated  transcripts  from  Camden  and 
Speed,  but  richly  ornamented,  and  pompously  printed, 
which  this  literary  adventurer,  said  to  have  been  a  gen- 
tleman, loaded  the  world  with,  by  the  aid  of  his  sub- 
scribers. Another  age  was  that  of  Dedications*  when 
the  author  was  to  lift  his  tiny  patron  to  the  skies,  in  an 

*  This  practice  of  dedications  had  indeed  flourished  before;  for 
authors  liad  even  prefixed  numerous  dedications  to  the  same  work 
or  dedicated  to  different  patrons  the  separate  divisions.  Fuller's 
"Church  History"  is  disgraced  by  the  introduction  of  twelve  title- 
pages,  besides  the  general  one;  with  as  many  particular  dedications, 
and  no  less  than  fifty  or  sixty  inscriptions,  addressed  to  benefactors; 
for  which  he  is  severely  censured  by  Heylin.  It  was  an  expedient  to 
procure  dedication  fees ;  for  publishing  books  by  subscription  was  an 
art  not  then  discovered. 


4S  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

inverse  ratio  as  he  lowered  himself,  in  this  public  exhibi- 
tion. Sometimes  the  party  haggled  about  the  price*  or 
the  statue,  while  stepping  into  his  niche,  would  turn 
round  on  the  author  to  assist  his  invention.  A  patron 
of  Peter  Motteux,  dissatisfied  with  Peter's  colder  tem- 
perament, composed  the  superlative  dedication  to  him- 
self, and  completed  the  misery  of  the  author  by  subscrib- 
ing it  with  Motteux's  name  J  f  Worse  fared  it  when  au- 
thors were  the  unlucky  hawkers  of  their  own  works ;  of 
which  I  shall  give  a  remarkable  instance  in  Myles  Davies, 
a  learned  man  maddened  by  want  and  indignation. 

*  The  price  of  the  dedication  of  a  play  was  even  fixed,  from  five  to 
ten  guineas,  from  the  Revolution  to  the  time  of  George  I.,  when  it  rose 
to  twenty — but  sometimes  a  bargain  was  to  be  struck — when  the 
author  and  the  play  were  alike  indifferent.  Even  on  these  terms 
could  vanity  be  gratified  with  the  coarse  luxury  of  panegyric,  of 
which  every  one  knew  the  price. 

f  This  circumstance  was  so  notorious  at  the  time,  that  it  occasioned 
a  poetical  satire  in  a  dialogue  between  Motteux  and  his  patron  Hen- 
ningham — preserved  in  that  vast,  flower-bed  or  dunghill,  for  it  is  both, 
of  "Poems  on  Affairs  of  State,-'  vol.  ii.  251.  The  patron,  in  his  zeal 
to  omit  no  possible  distinction  that  could  attach  to  him,  had  given  one 
circumstance  which  no  one  but  himself  could  have  known,  and  which 
hs  thus  regrets : 

" TATROX. 
I  must  confess  I  was  to  blame 
That  one  particular  to  name ; 
The  rest  could  never  have  been  known, 
I  made  the  style  so  like  thy  own, 

POET. 

I  beg  your  pardon,  Sir,  for  that  1 

PATRON. 

"Why  d e  what  would  you  be  at  ? 

/  writ  below  myself,  you  sot! 
Avoiding  figures,  tropes,  what  not; 
For  fear  I  should  my  fancy  raise 
Above  Qic  kvel  of  thy  plays  I" 


A   MENDICANT   AUTHOR.  49 

The  subject  before  us  exhibits  one  of  the  most  singu- 
lar spectacles  in  these  volumes;  that  of  a  scholar  of 
extensive  erudition,  whose  life  seems  to  have  passed  in 
the  study  of  languages  and  the  sciences,  while  his  facul- 
ties appear  to  have  been  disordered  from  the  simplicity 
of  his  nature,  and  driven  to  madness  by  indigence  and 
insult.  He  formed  the  wild  resolution  of  becoming  a 
mendicant  author,  the  hawker  of  his  own  works ;  and  by 
this  mode  endured  all  the  aggravated  sufferings,  the 
great  and  the  petty  insults  of  all  ranks  of  society,  and 
even  sometimes  from  men  of  learning  themselves,  who 
denied  a  mendicant  author  the  sympathy  of  a  brother. 

Myles  Davies  and  his  works  are  imperfectly  known 
to  the  most  curious  of  our  literary  collectors.  His  name 
has  scarcely  reached  a  few ;  the  author  and  his  works 
are  equally  extraordinary,  and  claim  a  right  to  be  pre- 
served in  this  treatise  on  the  "  Calamities  of  Authors." 

Our  author  commenced  printing  a  work,  difficult,  from 
its  miscellaneous  character,  to  describe ;  of  which  the 
volumes  appeared  at  different  periods.  The  early  and 
the  most  valuable  volumes  were  the  first  and  second  ; 
they  are  a  kind  of  bibliographical,  biograj)hical,  and 
critical  work,  on  English  Authors.  They  all  bear  a 
general  title  of  "  Athense  Britannicae."  * 

*  "  Athena  Britannicce,  or  a  Critical  History  of  the  Oxford  and  Cam- 
bridge "Writers  and  Writings,  with  those  of  the  Dissenters  and  Ro- 
manists, as  well  as  other  Authors  and  Worthies,  both  Domestic  and 
Foreign,  both  Ancient  and  Modern.  Together  with  an  occasional 
freedom  of  thought,  in  criticising  and  comparing  the  parallel  qualifi- 
cations of  the  most  eminent  authors  and  their  performances,  both  in 
MS.  and  print,  both  at  home  and  abroad.  By  M.  D.  London,  1716." 
4. 


50  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

Collectors  have  sometimes  met  with  a  very  curious 
volume,  entitled  "Icon  Libellorum,"  and  sometimes  the 
same  book,  under  another  title — "A  Critical  History 
of  Pamphlets."  This  rare  book  forms  the  first  volume 
of  the  "  Athense  Britanniuae."  The  author  was  Myles 
Davies,  whose  biography  is  quite  unknown:  he  may 
now  be  his  own  biographer.  He  was  a  Welsh  clergy- 
man, a  vehement  foe  to  Popery,  Arianism,  and  Socinian- 
ism,  of  the  most  fervent  loyalty  to  George  I.  and  the 
Hanoverian  succession ;  a  scholar,  skilled  in  Greek  and 
Latin,  and  in  all  the  modern  languages.  Quitting  his 
native  spot  with  political  disgust,  he  changed  his  char- 
acter in  the  metropolis,  for  he  subscribes  himself  "  Coun- 
sellor-at-Law."  In  an  evil  hour  he  commenced  author, 
not  only  surrounded  by  his  books,  but  with  the  more 
urgent  companions  of  a  wife  and  family ;  and  with  that 
childlike  simplicity  which  sometimes  marks  the  mind 
of  a  retired  scholar,  we  perceive  him  imagining  that  his 
immense  reading  would  prove  a  source,  not  easily  ex- 
hausted, for  their  subsistence. 

On  the  first  volume  of  this  series,  Dr.  Farmer,  a  bloodhound  of  un- 
failing scent  in  curious  and  obscure  English  books,  has  written  on  the 
■'This  is  the  only  copy  I  have  met  with.''  Even  the  great  bibli- 
ographer. Baker,  of  Cambridge,  never  met  but  with  three  volumes  (the 
edition  at  the  British  Museum  is  in  seven),  sent  him  as  a  great  curi- 
osity by  the  Earl  of  Oxford,  and  now  deposited  in  his  collection  at  St. 
John's  College.  Baker  has  written  this  memorandum  in  the  lirst 
volume:  "  Few  copies  were  printed,  so  the  work  has  become  scarce, 
and  for  that  reason  will  be  valued.  The  book  in  the  greatest  part 
is  borrowed  from  modern  historians,  but  yet  contaius  some  tilings 
more  uncommon,  and  not  easily  to  be  met  with."  How  superlatively 
rare  must  be  the  English  volumes  which  the  eyes  of  Farmer  and 
Baker  never  lighted  on  I 


A    MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  51 

From  the  first  volumes  of  his  series  much  curious  lit- 
erary history  may  he  extracted,  amidst  the  loose  and 
wandering  elements  of  this  literary  chaos.  In  his  dedi- 
cation to  the  Prince  he  professes  "  to  represent  writers 
and  writings  in  a  eatoptrick  view." 

The  preface  to  the  second  volume  opens  his  plan ; 
and  nothing  as  yet  indicates  those  ramhling  humours 
which  his  subsequent  labours  exhibit. 

As  he  proceeded  in  forming  these  volumes,  I  suspect, 
either  that  his  mind  became  a  little  disordered,  or  that 
he  discovered  that  mere  literature  found  but  penurious 
patrons  in  "  the  Few ;"  for,  attempting  to  gain  over  all 
classes  of  society,  he  varied  his  investigations,  and 
courted  attention,  by  writing  on  law,  physic,  divinity, 
as  well  as  literary  topics.     By  his  account — 

"The  avarice  of  booksellers,  and  the  stinginess  of 
hard-hearted  patrons,  had  driven  him  into  a  cursed  com- 
pany of  door-keeping  herds,  to  meet  the  irrational  bru- 
tality of  those  uneducated  mischievous  animals  called 
footmen,  house-porters,  poetasters,  mumpers,  apotheca- 
ries, attorneys,  and  such  like  beasts  of  prey,"  who  were, 
like  himself,  sometimes  barred  up  for  hours  in  the  mena- 
gerie of  a  great  man's  antechamber.     In  his  addresses 

to  to 

to  Drs.  Mead  and  Freind,  he  declares — "  My  misfortunes 
drive  me  to  publish  my  writings  for  a  poor  livelihood ; 
and  nothing  but  the  utmost  necessity  could  make  any 
man  in  his  senses  to  endeavour  at  it,  in  a  method  so 
burthensome  to  the  modesty  and  education  of  a  scholar." 
In  French  he  dedicates  to  George  I. ;  and  in  the 
Harleian  MSS.  I  discovered  a  loner  letter  to  the  Earl 


52  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

of  Oxford,  by  our  author,  in  French,  with  a  Latin  ode. 
Never  was  more  innocent  bribery  proffered  to  a  minis- 
ter !  He  composed  what  lie  calls  Strictures  Pindaricce 
on  the  "Mughouses,"  then  political  clubs;*  celebrates 
English  authors  in  the  same  odes,  and  inserts  a  political 
Latin  drama,  called  "Pallas  Anglicana."  Msevius  and 
Bavius  were  never  more  indefatigable !  The  author's 
intellect  gradually  discovers  its  confusion  amidst  the 
loud  cries  of  penury  and  despair. 

To  paint  the  distresses  of  an  author  soliciting  alms 
for  a  book  which  he  presents — and  which,  whatever  may 
be  its  value,  comes  at  least  as  an  evidence  that  the  sup- 
pliant is  a  learned  man — is  a  case  so  uncommon,  that  the 
invention  of  the  novelist  seems  necessary  to  fill  up  the 
picture.  But  Myles  Davies  is  an  artist  in  his  own  sim- 
ple narrative. 

*  These  clubs  are  described  in  Macky's  "Journey  through  Eng- 
land," 1724.  lie  says  they  were  formed  to  uphold  the  Royalist  party 
on  the  accession  of  King  George  I.  "  This  induced  a  set  of  gentlemen 
to  establish  Mughouses  in  all  the  corners  of  this  great  city,  for  well- 
affected  tradesmen  to  meet  and  keep  up  the  spirit  of  loyalty  to  the 
Protestant  succession,"  and  to  be  ready  to  join  their  forces  for  the 
suppression  of  the  other  party.  "Many  an  encounter  they  had,  till 
at  last  the  Parliament  was  obliged  by  a  law  to  put  an  end  to  this  city 
strife,  which  had  this  good  effect,  that  upon  the  pulling  down  of  the 
Mughouse  in  Salisbury  Court,  for  which  some  boys  were  hanged  on 
this  act.  the  city  has  not  been  troubled  with  them  since."  It  was  the 
custom  in  these  houses  to  allow  no  other  drink  but  ale  to  be  con- 
sumed, which  was  brought  in  mugs  of  earthenware ;  a  chairman  was 
elected,  and  he  called  on  the  members  of  the  company  for  songs, 
which  were  generally  party  ballads  of  a  strongly-worded  kind,  as  may 
be  seen  in  the  small  collection  printed  in  1716,  entitled  "A  Collection 
of  State  Songs,  Poems,  &c,  published  since  the  Rebellion,  and  sung  in 
the  several  Mughouses  in  the  cities  of  London  and  Westminster." — Ed. 


A    MENDICANT   AUTHOR.  53 

Our  author  has  given  the  names  of  several  of  his  un- 
willing customers  : — 

"  Those  squeeze-farthing  and  hoard-penny  ignoramus 
doctors,  with  several  great  personages  who  formed  ex- 
cuses for  not  accepting  my  books ;  or  they  would  receive 
them,  but  give  nothing  for  them ;  or  else  deny  they  had 
them,  or  remembered  anything  of  them ;  and  so  gave 
me  nothing  for  my  last  present  of  books,  though  they 
kept  them  gratis  et  ingratiis. 

"But  his  Grace  of  the  Dutch  extraction  in  Holland 
(said  to  be  akin  to  Mynheer  Vander  B — nek)  had  a  pe- 
culiar grace  in  receiving  my  present  of  books  and  odes, 
which,  being  bundled  up  together  with  a  letter  and  ode 
upon  his  Graceship,  and  carried  in  by  his  porter,  I  was 
bid  to  call  for  an  answer  five  years  hence.  I  asked  the 
porter  what  he  meant  by  that  ?  I  suppose,  said  he,  four 
or  five  days  hence;  but  it  proved  five  or  six  months 
after,  before  I  could  get  any  answer,  though  I  had  writ 
five  or  six  letters  in  French  with  fresh  odes  upon  his 
Graceship,  and  an  account  where  I  lived,  and  what  noble- 
men had  accepted  of  my  present.  I  attended  about  the 
door  three  or  four  times  a  week  all  that  time  constantly 
from  twelve  to  four  or  five  o'clock  in  the  evening;  and 
walking  under  the  fore  windows  of  the  parlours,  once 
that  time  his  and  her  Grace  came  after  dinner  to  stare 
at  me,  with  open  windows  and  shut  mouths,  but  filled 
with  fair  water,  which  they  spouted  with  so  much  dex- 
terity that  they  twisted  the  water  through  their  teeth 
and  mouth-skrew,  to  flash  near  my  face,  and  yet  just  to 
miss  me,  though  my  nose  could  not  well  miss  the  natural 


54  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

flavour  of  the  orange-water  showering  so  very  near  ma 
Her  Grace  began  the  water-work,  but  not  very  grace- 
fully, especially  for  an  English  lady  of  her  description, 
airs,  and  qualities,  to  make  a  stranger  her  spitting-post, 
who  had  been  guilty  of  no  other  offence  than  to  offer 
her  husband  some  writings. — His  Grace  followed,  yet 
first  stood  looking  so  wistfully  towards  me,  that  I  verily 
thought  he  had  a  mind  to  throw  me  a  guinea  or  two  for 
all  these  indignities,  and  two  or  three  months'  then  sleeve- 
less waiting  upon  him — and  accordingly  I  advanced  to 
address  his  Grace  to  remember  the  poor  author;  but, 
instead  of  an  answer,  he  immediately  undams  his  mouth, 
out  fly  whole  showers  of  lymphatic  rockets,  which  had 
like  to  have  put  out  my  mortal  eyes." 

Still  he  was  not  disheartened,  and  still  applied  for  his 
bundle  of  books,  which  were  returned  to  him  at  length 
unopened,  with  "  half  a  guinea  upon  top  of  the  cargo," 
and  "  with  a  desire  to  receive  no  more.  I  plucked  up 
courage,  murmuring  within  myself — 

'Tu  ne  cede  malis,  sed  contra  audentior  ito.'" 

He  sarcastically  observes, 

"  As  I  was  still  jogging  on  homewards,  I  thought  that 
a  great  many  were  called  their  Graces,  not  for  any  grace 
or  favour  they  had  truly  deserved  with  God  or  man,  but 
for  the  same  reason  of  contraries,  that  the  Parcce  or 
Destinies,  were  so  called,  because  they  spared  none,  or 
were  not  truly  the  Parcce,  quia  non  parcebant" 

Our  indigent  and  indignant  author,  by  the  faithfulness 
of  his  representations,  mingles  with  his  anger  some 
ludicrous  scenes  of  literary  mendicity. 


A    MENDICANT    AUTHOR.  55 

"I  can't  choose  (now  I  am  upon  the  fatal  subject) 
but  make  one  observation  or  two  more  upon  the  various 
rencontres  and  adventures  I  met  withall,  in  presenting 
my  books  to  those  who  were  likely  to  accept  of  them 
for  their  own  information,  or  for  that  of  helping  a  poor 
scholar,  or  for  their  own  vanity  or  ostentation. 

"  Some  parsons  would  hollow  to  raise  the  whole  house 
and  posse  of  the  domestics  to  raise  a  poor  crown  •  at 
last  all  that  nutter  ends  in  sending  Jack  or  Tom  out  to 
change  a  guinea,  and  then  'tis  reckoned  over  half-a-dozen 
times  before  the  fatal  crown  can  be  picked  out,  which 
must  be  taken  as  it  is  given,  with  all  the  parade  of  alms- 
giving, and  so  to  be  received  with  all  the  active  and 
passive  ceremonial  of  mendication  and  alms-receiving — 
as  if  the  books,  printing  and  paper,  were  worth  nothing 
at  all,  and  as  if  it  were  the  greatest  charity  for  them  to 
touch  them  or  let  them  be  in  the  house ;  '  For  I  shall 
never  read  them,'  says  one  of  the  five-shilling-piece 
chaps ;  '  I  have  no  time  to  look  in  them,'  says  another ; 
'  'Tis  so  much  money  lost,'  says  a  grave  dean  ;  '  My  eyes 
being  so  bad,'  said  a  bishop,  '  that  I  can  scarce  read  at 
all.'  '  What  do  you  want  with  me  ?'  said  another ;  '  Sir, 
I  presented  you  the  other  day  with  my  Athence  Brltan- 
nicce,  being  the  last  part  published.'  '  I  don't  want 
books,  take  them  again  ;  I  don't  understand  what  they 
mean.'  '  The  title  is  very  plain,'  said  I,  '  and  they  are 
writ  mostly  in  English.'  '  I'll  give  you  a  crown  for  both 
the  volumes.'  '  They  stand  me,  sir,  in  more  than  that, 
and  'tis  for  a  bare  subsistence  I  present  or  sell  them ; 
how  shall  I  live  ?'     '  I  care  not  a  farthing  for  that;  live 


56  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTH3RS. 

or  die,  'tis  all  one  to  me.'  '  Damn  my  master !'  said  Jack, 
'  'twas  but  last  night  he  was  commending  your  books 
and  your  learning  to  the  skies ;  and  now  he  would  not 
care  if  you  were  starving  before  his  eyes ;  nay,  he  often 
makes  game  at  your  clothes,  though  he  thinks  you  the 
greatest  scholar  in  England.'  " 

Such  was  the  life  of  a  learned  mendicant  author!  The 
scenes  which  are  here  exhibited  appear  to  have  disorder- 
ed an  intellect  which  had  never  been  firm ;  in  vain  our 
author  attempted  to  adapt  his  talents  to  all  orders  of 
men,  still  "  To  the  crazy  ship  all  winds  are  contrary." 


COWLEY. 


OF    HIS    MELANCHOLY. 


t  I  ^HE  mind  of  Cowley  was  beautiful,  but  a  querulous 
tenderness  in  his  nature  breathes  not  only  through 
his  works,  but  influenced  his  habits  and  his  views  of 
human  affairs.  His  temper  and  his  genius  Avould  have 
opened  to  us,  had  not  the  strange  decision  of  Sprat  and 
Clifford  withdrawn  that  full  correspondence  of  his  heart 
which  he  had  carried  on  many  years.  These  letters  were 
suppressed  because,  as  Bishop  Sprat  acknowledges,  "in 
this  kind  of  prose  Mr.  Cowley  was  excellent !  They  had 
a  domestical  plainness,  and  a  peculiar  kind  of  familiarity." 
And  then  the  florid  writer  runs  off,  that,  "in  letters, 
where  the  souls  of  men  should  appear  undressed,  in  that 
negligent  habit  they  may  be  lit  to  be  seen  by  one  or  two 
in  a  chamber,  but  not  to  go  abroad  in  the  streets."     A 


COWLEY— OF  HIS    MELANCHOLY.  57 

false  criticism:  which  not  only  has  proved  to  be  so  since 
their  time  by  Mason's  "  Memoirs  of  Gray,"  but  which 
these  friends  of  Cowley  might  have  themselves  perceiv- 
ed, if  they  had  recollected  that  the  Letters  of  Cicero  to 
Atticus  form  the  most  delightful  chronicles  of  the 
heart — and  the  most  authentic  memorials  of  the  man. 
Peck  obtained  one  letter  of  Cowley's,  preserved  by 
Johnson,  and  it  exhibits  a  remarkable  picture  of  the 
miseries  of  his  poetical  solitude.  It  is,  perhaps,  not  too 
late  to  inquire  whether  this  correspondence  was  destroy- 
ed as  well  as  suppressed  ?  Would  Sprat  and  Clifford 
have  burned  what  they  have  told  us  they  so  much 
admired  ?  * 

*  My  researches  could  never  obtain  more  than  one  letter  of  Cowley's 
— it  is  but  an  elegant  trifle — returning  thanks  to  his  friend  Evelyn 
for  some  seeds  and  plants.  "The  Garden"  of  Evelyn  is  immortalised 
in  a  delightful  Ode  of  Cowley's,  as  well  as  by  Evelyn  himself  EveD 
in  this  small  note  we  may  discover  the  touch  of  Cowley.  The  original 
is  in  Astle's  collection. 

MR.    ABRAHAM    COWLEY   TO   JOHX   EVELYN,    ESQ. 

"  Bam  Elms,  March  23,  1663. 
"  Sir, — There  is  nothing  more  pleasant  than  to  see  kindness  in  a 
person  for  whom  we  have  great  esteem  and  respect:  no,  not  the -sight 
of  your  garden  in  May,  or  even  the  having  such  an  one ;  which  makes 
me  more  obliged  to  return  you  my  most  humble  thanks  for  the  testi- 
monies I  have  lately  received  of  you,  both  by  your  letter  and  your 
presents.  I  have  already  sowed  such  of  your  seeds  as  I  thought  most 
proper  upon  a  hot-bed ;  but  cannot  find  in  all  my  books  a  catalogue  of 
these  plants  which  require  that  culture,  nor  of  such  as  must  be  set  in 
pots ;  which  defects,  and  all  others,  I  hope  shortly  to  see  supplied,  as 
I  hope  shortly  to  see  your  work  of  Horticulture  finished  and  publish- 
ed ;  and  long  to  be  in  all  things  your  disciple,  as  I  am  in  all  tilings 
now, 

"  Sir,  your  most  humble  and  most  obedient  Servant, 

"A.  Cowley." 


53  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

Fortunately  for  our  literary  sympathy,  the  fatal  error 
of  these  fastidious  critics  has  been  in  some  degree  re- 
paired by  the  admirable  genius  himself  whom  they  have 
injured.  When  Cowley  retreated  from  society,  he  de- 
termined to  draw  up  an  apology  for  his  conduct,  and  to 
have  dedicated  it  to  his  patron,  Lord  St.  Albans.  His 
death  interrupted  the  entire  design;  but  his  Essays, 
which  Pope  so  finely  calls  "the  language  of  his  heart," 
are  evidently  parts  of  these  precious  Confessions.  All 
of  Cowley's  tenderest  and  undisguised  feelings  have 
therefore  not  perished.  These  Essays  now  form  a  species 
of  composition  in  our  language,  a  mixture  of  prose  and 

[Barn  Elms,  from  whence  this  letter  is  dated,  was  the  first  country 
residence  of  Cowley.  It  lies  low  on  the  banks  of  the  Than:es.  and 
here  the  poet  was  first  seized  with  a  fever,  which  obliged  him  to 
remove;  but  he  chose  an  equally  improper  locality  for  a  man  of  his 
temperament,  in  Chertsey,  where  he  died  from  the  effects  of  a  severe 
cold.] 

Such  were  the  ordinary  letters  which  passed  between  two  men 
whom  it  would  be  difficult  to  parallel  for  their  elegant  tastes  and 
geutle  dispositions.  Evelyn's  beautiful  retreat  at  Saves  Court,  at 
Deptford,  is  described  by  a  contemporary  as  "a  garden  exquisite  and 
most  boscaresque.  and.  as  it  were,  an  exemplar  of  his  book  of  Forest- 
trees."  It  was  the  entertainment  and  wonder  of  the  greatest  men  of 
those  times,  aDd  inspired  the  following  lines  of  Cowley,  to  Evelyn  and 
his  lady,  who  excelled  in  the  arts  her  husband  loved ;  for  she  designed 
the  frontispiece  to  his  version  of  Lucretius — 

"In  books  and  gardens  thou  hast  placed  aright 

(Things  well  which  thou  dost  understand, 
And  both  dost  make  with  thy  Jaborious  hand) 

Thy  noble  innocent  delight; 
And  in  thy  virtuous  wife,  where  thou  again  dost  meet 

Both  pleasures  more  refined  and  sweet; 

The  fairest  garden  in  her  looks, 

And  in  her  mind  the  wisest  books." 


COWLEY— OF    HIS    MELANCHOLY.  59 

verse — the  man  with  the  poet — the  self-painter  has  sat 
to  himself,  and,  Avith  the  utmost  simplicity,  has  copied 
out  the  image  of  his  soul. 

Why  has  this  poet  twice  called  himself  the  melancholy 
Cowley?  He  employed  no  poetical  cheville*  for  the 
metre  of  a  verse  which  his  own  feelings  inspired. 

Cowley,  at  the  beginning  of  the  Civil  "War,  joined  the 
Royalists  at  Oxford ;  followed  the  queen  to  Paris ; 
yielded  his  days  and  his  nights  to  an  employment  of  the 
highest  confidence,  that  of  deciphering  the  royal  cor- 
respondence ;  he  transacted  their  business,  and,  almost 
divorcing  himself  from  his  neglected  muse,  he  yielded 
up  for  them  the  tranquillity  so  necessary  to  the  existence 
of  a  poet.  From  his  earliest  days  he  tells  us  how  the 
poetic  affections  had  stamped  themselves  on  his  heart, 
"  like  letters  cut  into  the  bark  of  a  young  tree,  which, 
with  the  tree,  will  grow  proportionably." 

He  describes  his  feelings  at  the  court : — 

"  I  saw  plainly  all  the  paint  of  that  kind  of  life  the 
nearer  I  came  to  it — that  beauty  which  I  did  not  fall  in 
love  with  when,  for  aught  I  knew,  it  was  real,  was  not 
like  to  bewitch  or  entice  me  when  I  saw  it  was  adulter- 
ate. I  met  with  several  great  persons  whom  I  liked 
very  well,  but  could  not  perceive  that  any  part  of  their 
greatness  was  to  be  liked  or  desired.  I  was  in  a  crowd 
of  good  company,  in  business  of  great  and  honourable 
trust ;  I  eat  at  the  best  table,  and  enjoyed  the  best 
conveniences  that  ought  to  be  desired  by  a  man  of  my 

*  A  term  the  French  apply  to  those  botches  which  bad  poets  use  to 
make  out  their  metre. 


60  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

condition ;  yet  I  could  not  abstain  from  renewing  my 

old  schoolboy's  wish,  in  a  copy  of  verses  to  the  same 

effect : — 

"  Well  then !  I  now  do  plainly  see, 
This  busie  world  and  I  shall  ne'er  agree  1" 

After  several  years'  absence  from  his  native  country, 
at  a  most  critical  period,  he  was  sent  over  to  mix  with 
that  trusty  band  of  loyalists,  who,  in  secrecy  and  in 
silence,  were  devoting  themselves  to  the  royal  cause. 
Cowley  was  seized  on  by  the  ruling  powers.  At  this 
moment  he  published  a  preface  to  his  works,  which 
some  of  his  party  interpreted  as  a  relaxation  of  his 
loyalty.  He  has  been  fully  defended.  Cowley,  with  all 
his  delicacy  of  temper,  wished  sincerely  to  retire  from 
all  parties ;  and  saw  enough  among  the  fiery  zealots 
of  his  own,  to  grow  disgusted  even  with  Royalists. 

His  wish  for  retirement  has  been  half  censured  as 
cowardice  by  Johnson  ;  but  there  was  a  tenderness  of 
feeling  which  had  ill-formed  Cowley  for  the  cunning  of 
party  intriguers,  and  the  company  of  little  villains. 
About  this  time  he  might  have  truly  distinguished  him- 
self as  "  The  melancholy  Cowley." 

I  am  only  tracing  his  literary  history  for  the  purpose 
of  this  work :  but  I  cannot  pass  without  noticing  the 
fact,  that  this  abused  man,  whom,  his  enemies  were 
calumniating,  was  at  this  moment,  under  the  disguise 
of  a  doctor  o1-  physic,  occupied  by  the  novel  studies  of 
botany  and  medicine;  and  as  all  science  in  the  mind 
of  the  poet  naturally  becomes  poetry,  he  composed  his 
books  on  plants  in  Latin  verse. 


COWLEY— OF    HIS    MELANCHOLY.  61 

At  length  came  the  Restoration,  which  the  poet 
zealously  celebrated  in  his  "Ode"  on  that  occasion. 
Both  Charles  the  First  and  Second  had  promised  to 
reward  his  fidelity  with  the  mastership  of  the  Savoy; 
hut.  Wood  says,  "  he  lost  it  by  certain  persons  enemies 
of  the  muses."  Wood  has  said  no  more ;  and  none 
of  Cowley's  biographers  have  thrown  any  light  on  the 
circumstance :  perhaps  we  may  discover  this  literary 
calamity. 

That  Cowley  caught  no  warmth  from  that  promised 
sunshine  which  the  new  monarch  was  to  scatter  in 
prodigal  gaiety,  Has  been  distinctly  told  by  the  poet 
himself;  his  muse,  in  "The  Complaint,"  having  reproach- 
ed him  thus : — 

Thou  young  prodigal,  who  didst  so  loosely  waste 

Of  all  thy  youthful  years,  the  good  estate — 

Thou  changeling  then,  bewitch'd  with  noise  and  show, 

"Wouldst  into  courts  and  cities  from  me  go — 

Go,  renegado,  cast  up  thy  account — 

Behold  the  public  storm  is  spent  at  last; 

The  sovereign  is  toss'd  at  sea  no  more, 

And  thou,  with  all  the  noble  company, 

Art  got  at  last  to  shore — 
But  whilst  thy  fellow-voyagers  I  see, 
All  march'd  up  to  possess  the  promis'd  land; 
Thou  still  alone  (alas !)  dost  gaping  stand 
Upon  the  naked  beach,  upon  the  barren  sand. 

But  neglect  was  not  all  Cowley  had  to  endure ;  the 
royal  party  seemed  disposed  to  calumniate  him.  When 
Cowley  w7as  young  he  had  hastily  composed  the  comedy 
of  "  The  Guardian ;"  a  piece  wdiich  served  the  cause  of 
loyalty.     After  the  Restoration,  he  rewrote  it  under  the 


62  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

title  of  "  Cutter  of  Coleman  Street ;"  a  comedy  which 
may  still  be  read  with  equal  curiosity  and  interest :  a 
spirited  picture  of  the  peculiar  characters  which  ap- 
peared at  the  Revolution.  It  was  not  only  ill  received 
by  a  faction,  but  by  those  vermin  of  a  new  court,  who, 
without  merit  themselves,  put  in  their  claims,  by  crying 
down  those  who,  with  great  merit,  are  not  in  favour. 
All  these  to  a  man  accused  the  author  of  having  written 
a  satire  against  the  king's  party.  And  this  wretched 
party  prevailed,  too  long  for  the  author's  repose,  but  not 
for  his  fame.*  Many  years  afterwards  this  comedy  be- 
came popular.  Dryden,  wdio  was  present  at  the  represen- 
tation, tells  us  that  Cowley  "received  the  news  of  his  ill 
success  not  with  so  much  firmness  as  might  have  been 
expected  from  so  great  a  man."  Cowley  was  in  truth  a 
great  man,  and  a  greatly  injured  man.  His  sensibility 
and  delicacy  of  temper  were  of  another  texture  than 
Dry  den's.  What  at  that  moment  did  Cowley  expe- 
rience, when  he  beheld  himself  neglected,  calumniated, 
and,  in  his  last  appeal  to  public  favour,  found  himself 

*  This  comedy  was  first  presented  very  hurriedly  for  the  amuse- 
ment of  Prince  Charles  as  he  passed  through  Cambridge  to  York. 
Cowley  himself  describes  it,  then,  as  "  neither  made  nor  acted,  but 
rowjh-drawn  by  him,  and  repeated  by  his  scholars  "  for  this  temporary 
purpose.  After  the  Restoration  he  endeavoured  to  do  more  justice  to 
his  juvenile  work,  "  y  remodelling  it.  and  producing  it  at  the  Duke  of 
York's  theatre.  But  as  many  of  the  characters  necessarily  retained 
the-  features  of  the  older  play,  and  times  had  changed;  it  was  easy  to 
affix  a  false  stigma  to  the  poet's  picinrcs  of  the  old  Cavaliers;  and  the 
play  was  universally  condemned  as  a  satire  on  the  Royalists.  It  was 
duced  with  success  at  the  theatre  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields,  as 
long  afterwards  as  the  year  17 DO. — Ed. 


COWLEY— OF  HIS    MELANCIIOLY.  63 

still  a  victim  to  a  vile  faction,  who,  to  court  their  com- 
mon master,  were  trampling  on  their  honest  brother? 

We  shall  find  an  unbroken  chain  of  evidence,  clearly 
demonstrating  the  agony  of  his  literary  feelings.  The 
cynical  Wood  tells  us  that,  "not  finding  that  preferment 
he  expected,  while  others  for  their  money  carried  away 
most  places,  he  retired  discontented  into  Surrey."  And 
his  panegyrist,  Sprat,  describes  him  as  "  weary  of  the 
vexations  and  formalities  of  an  active  condition — he  had 
been  perplexed  with  a  long  compliance  with  foreign 
manners.  He  was  satiated  with  the  arts  of  a  court, 
which  sort  of  life,  though  his  virtue  made  it  innocent  to 
him,  yet  nothing  could  make  it  quiet.  These  were  the 
reasons  that  moved  him  to  follow  the  violent  inclination 
of  his  own  mind,"  &c.  I  doubt  if  either  the  sarcastic 
antiquary  or  the  rhetorical  panegyrist  have  developed 
the  simple  truth  of  Cowley's  "  violent  inclination  of  his 
own  mind."  He  does  it  himself  more  openly  in  that 
beautiful  picture  of  an  injured  j:>oet,  in  "The  Com- 
plaint," an  ode  warm  with  individual  feeling,  but  which 
Johnson  coldly  passes  over,  by  telling  us  that  "  it  met 
the  usual  fortune  of  complaints,  and  seems  to  have 
excited  more  contempt  than  pity." 

Thus  the  biographers  of  Cowley  have  told  us  nothing 
and  the  poet  himself  has  probably  not  told  us  all.  To 
these  calumnies  respecting  Cowley's  comedy,  raised  up 
by  those  whom  Wood  designates  as  "  enemies  of  the 
muses,"  it  would  appear  that  others  were  added  of  a 
deeper  dye,  and  in  malignant  whispers  distilled  into  the 
ear  of  royalty.     Cowley,  in  an  ode,  had  commemorated 


64  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

the  genius  of  Brutus,  with  all  the  enthusiasm  of  a  votary 
of  liberty.  After  the  king's  return,  when  Cowley  soli- 
cited some  reward  for  his  sufferings  and  services  in  the 
royal  cause,  the  chancellor  is  said  to  have  turned  on  him 
with  a  severe  countenance,  saying,  "Mr.  Cowley,  your 
pardon  is  your  reward  !"  It  seems  that  ode  was  then 
considered  to  be  of  a  dangerous  tendency  among  half  the 
nation ;  Brutus  would  be  the  model  of  enthusiasts,  who 
were  sullenly  bending  their  neck  under  the  yoke  of  roy- 
alty. Charles  II.  feared  the  attempt  of  desperate  men  ; 
and  he  might  have  forgiven  Rochester  a  loose  pasquin- 
ade, but  not  Cowley  a  solemn  invocation.  This  fact, 
then,  is  said  to  have  been  the  true  cause  of  the  despond- 
ency so  prevalent  in  the  latter  poetry  of  "  the  melan- 
choly Cowley."  And  hence  the  indiscretion  of  the  muse, 
in  a  single  flight,  condemned  her  to  a  painful,  rather  than 
a  voluntary  solitude ;  and  made  the  poet  complain  of 
"barren  praise"  and  "neglected  verse."* 

While  this  anecdote  harmonises  with  better  known 
facts,  it  throws  some  light  on  the  outcry  raised  against 
the  comedy,  which  seems  to  have  been  but  an  echo  of 
some  preceding  one.  Cowley  retreated  into  solitude, 
where  he  found  none  of  the  agrestic  charms  of  the  land- 
scapes of  his  muse.  When  in  the  world,  Sprat  says,  "  he 
had  never  wanted  for  constant  health  and  strength  of 
body ;"  but,  thrown  into  solitude,  he  carried  with  him  a 
wounded  spirit — the  Ode  of  Brutus  and  the  condemna- 

*  The  anecdote,  probably  little  known,  may  be  found  in  "The 
Judgment  of  Dr.  Prideaux  in  Condemning  the  Murder  of  Julius  Caesar 
by  the  Conspirators  as  a  most  villanous  act,  maintained,"  1721,  p.  41. 


COWLEY— OF   HIS   MELANCIIOLY.  65 

tion  of  his  comedy  were  the  dark  spirits  that  haunted  his 
cottage.  Ill  health  soon  succeeded  low  spirits — he  pined 
in  dejection,  and  perished  a  victim  of  the  finest  and  most 
injured  feelings. 

But  before  we  leave  the  melancholy  Coicley,  he  .shall 
speak  the  feelings,  which  here  are  not  exaggerated.  In 
this  Chronicle  of  Literary  Calamity  no  passage  ought  to 
be  more  memorable  than  the  solemn  confession  of  one  of 
the  most  amiable  of  men  and  poets. 

Thus  he  expresses  himself  in  the  preface  to  his  "  Cut- 
ter of  Coleman  Street." 

"  We  are  therefore  wonderful  wise  men,  and  have  a 
fine  business  of  it ;  we,  who  spend  our  time  in  poetry. 
I  do  sometimes  laugh,  and  am  often  angry  with  myself, 
when  I  think  on  it ;  and  if  I  had  a  son  inclined  by  nature 
to  the  same  folly,  I  believe  I  should  bind  him  from  it  by 
the  strictest  conjurations  of  a  paternal  blessing.  For 
what  can  be  more  ridiculous  than  to  labour  to  give  men 
delight,  whilst  they  labour,  on  their  part,  most  earnestly 
to  take  offence  ?" 

And  thus  he  closes  the  preface,  in  all  the  solemn  ex- 
pression of  injured  feelings: — "This  I  do  affirm,  that 
from  all  which  I  have  written,  I  never  received  the  least 
benefit  or  the  least  advantage  ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  have 
felt  sometimes  the  effects  of  malice  a?id  misfortune  !  " 

Cowley's  ashes  were  deposited  between  those  of  Chau- 
cer and  Spenser ;  a  marble  monument  was  erected  by  a 
duke ;  and  his  eulogy  was  pronounced,  on  the  day  of  his 
death,  from  the  lips  of  royalty.  The  learned  wrote,  and 
the  tuneful  wept :  well  might  the  neglected  bard,  in  his 


66  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

retirement,  compose  an  epitaph  on  himself,  living  there 
"  entombed,  though  not  dead." 

To  this  ambiguous  state  of  existence  he  applies  a  con- 
ceit, not  inelegant,  from  the  tenderness  of  its  imagery: 

Hie  sparge  flores.  sparge  breves  rosas, 

Xam  vita  gaudet  mortua  floribus; 
Herbisque  odoratis  corona 

Vatis  adhuc  einerem  calentem. 

IMITATED. 

Here  scatter  flowers  and  short-lived  roses  bring. 
For  life,  though  dead,  enjoys  the  flowers  of  spring; 
"With  breathing  wreatbs  of  fragrant  herbs  adorn 
The  yet  warm  embers  in  the  poet's  urn. 


THE  PAIXS  OF  FASTIDIOUS  EGOTISM. 

T  MUST  place  the  author  of  "  The  Catalogue  of  Royal 
~^-  and  Noble  Authors,"  who  himself  now  ornaments 
that  roll,  among  those  who  have  participated  in  the 
misfortunes  of  literature. 

Horace  Walpole  was  the  inheritor  of  a  name  the 
most  popular  in  Europe  ;*  he  moved  in  the  higher  circles 
of  society;  and  fortune  had  never  denied  him  the  ample 
gratification  of  his  lively  tastes  in  the  elegant  arts,  and 
in  curious  knowledge.  These  were  particular  advan- 
tages. But  Horace  "Walpole  panted  with  a  secret  desire 
for  literary  celebrity ;  a  full  sense  of  his  distinguished 
rank  long  suppressed  the  desire  of  venturing  the  name 
he  bore   to  the   uncertain   fame  of  an  author,  and  the 

*  He  was  the  youngest  sou  of  the  celebrated  minister,  Sir  Robert 
Walpole.— Ed. 


THE   PAINS   OF   FASTIDIOUS    EGOTISM.  07 

caprice  of  vulgar  critics.  At  length  he  pretended  to 
shun  authors,  and  to  slight  the  honours  of  authorship. 
The  cause  of  this  contempt  has  been  attributed  to  the 
perpetual  consideration  of  his  rank.  But  was  this  bitter 
contempt  of  so  early  a  date  ?  Was  Horace  Walpole  a 
Socrates  before  his  time  ?  was  he  born  that  prodigy  of 
indifference,  to  despise  the  secret  object  he  languished  to 
possess  ?  His  early  associates  were  not  only  noblemen, 
but  literary  noblemen ;  and  need  he  have  been  so  petu- 
lantly fastidious  at  bearing  the  venerable  title  of  author, 
when  he  saw  Lyttleton,  Chesterfield,  and  other  peers, 
proud  of  wearing  the  blue  riband  of  literature  ?  No ! 
it  was  after  he  had  become  an  author  that  he  contemned 
authorship :  and  it  was  not  the  precocity  of  his  sagacity, 
but  the  maturity  of  his  experience,  that  made  him  will- 
ing enough  to  undervalue  literary  honours,  which  were 
not  sufficient  to  satisfy  his  desires. 

Let  us  estimate  the  genius  of  Horace  Walpole  by 
analysing  his  talents,  and  inquiring  into  the  nature  of 
his  works. 

His  taste  was  highly  polished ;  his  vivacity  attained 
to  brilliancy  ;*  and  his  picturesque  fancy,  easily  excited, 

*  In  his  letters  there  are  uncommon  instances  of  vivacity,  when- 
ever pointed  against  authors.  The  following  have  not  yet  met  the 
public  eye.  What  can  be  more  maliciously  pungent  than  this  on 
Spence?  "As  I  know  Mr.  J.  iSpence.  I  do  not  think  I  should  have 
been  so  much  delighted  as  Dr.  Kippis  with  reading  his  letters.  He 
was  a  good-nature  1  harmless  little  soul,  but  more  like  a  silver  penny 
than  a  genius.  It  was  a  neat  fiddle-faddle  bit  of  sterling,  that  had 
read  good  books,  and  kept  eood  company  ;  but  was  too  trifling  for  use, 
and  only  fit  10  please  a  child."  On  Dr.  Nash's  first  volume  of 
'  Worcestershire':   "  It  is  a  foiio  of  prodigious  corpulence,  and  yet  drf 


68  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

was  soon  extinguished ;  Lis  playful  wit  and  keen  irony 
"were  perpetually  exercised  in  Lis  observations  on  life, 
and  his  memory  was  stored  with  the  most  amusing 
knowledge,  but  much  too  lively  to  be  accurate  ;  for  his 
studies  were  but  his  sports.  But  other  qualities  of 
genius  must  distinguish  the  great  author,  and  even  him 
who  would  occupy  that  leading  rank  in  the  literary 
republic  our  author  aspired  to  till.  He  lived  too  much 
in  that  class  of  society  which  is  little  favourable  to 
genius ;  he  exerted  neither  profound  thinking,  nor 
profound  feeling;  and  too  volatile  to  attain  to  the 
pathetic,  that  higher  quality  of  genius,  he  was  so 
imbued  with  the  petty  elegancies  of  society  that  every 
impression  of  grandeur  in  the  human  character  was 
deadened  in  the  breast  of  the  polished  cynic. 

Horace  TValpole  was  not  a  man  of  genius, — his  most 
pleasing,  if  not  his  great  talent,  lay  in  letter-writing ; 
here  he  was  without  a  rival;*  but  he  probably  divined, 

enough ;  but  it  is  finely  dressed  with  many  heads  and  views."  He 
characterises  Pennant :  "  He  is  not  one  of  our  plodders  (alluding  to 
Gougli);  rather  the  other  extreme;  hi3  corporal  spirits  (for  I  cannot 
call  them  animal)  do  not  allow  him  to  digest  anything.  He  gave  a 
round  jump  trom  ornithology  to  antiquity,  and.  as  if  the}'  had  any 
relation,  thought  lie  understood  everything  that  lay  between  them. 
The  report  of  his  being  disordered  is  not  true;  he  has  been  with  me, 
and  at  least  is  as  composed  as  ever  I  saw  him.''  His  literary  corre- 
spondence with  his  friend  Cole  abouuds  with  this  easy  satirical  criti- 
cism— he  delighted  to  ridicule  authors ! — as  well  as  to  starve  the 
miserable  artists  he  so  grudgingly  paid.  In  the  very  volumes  he 
celebrated  the  arts,  he  disgraced  them  by  his  penuriousness ;  so  that 
he  loved  to  indulge  his  avarice  at  the  expense  of  his  vanity  1 

*  This  opinion  on  Walpole's  talent  for  letter-writing  was  published 
in  1S12,  many  years  beiore  the  public  hail  the  present  collection  of 


THE   PAINS  OP  FASTIDIOUS  EGOTISM.  69 

when  he  condescended  to  become  an  author,  that  some- 
thing more  was  required  than  the  talents  he  exactly- 
possessed.  In  his  latter  days  he  felt  this  more  sensibly, 
which  will  appear  in  those  confessions  which  I  have 
extracted  from  an  unpublished  correspondence. 

Conscious  of  possessing  the  talent  which  amuses,  yet 
feeling  his  deficient  energies,  he  resolved  to  provide 
various  substitutes  for  genius  itself;  and  to  acquire 
reputation,  if  he  could  not  grasp  at  celebrity.  He 
raised  a  printing-press  at  his  Gothic  castle,  by  which 
means  he  rendered  small  editions  of  his  works  valuable 
from  their  rarity,  and  much  talked  of,  because  seldom 
seen.  That  this  is  true,  appears  from  the  following 
extract  from  his  unpublished  correspondence  with  a 
literary  friend.  It  alludes  to  his  "  Anecdotes  of  Paint- 
ing in  England,"  of  which  the  first  edition  only  con- 
sisted of  300  copies. 

"  Of  my  new  fourth  volume  I  printed  600 ;  but,  as 
they  can  be  had,  I  believe  not  a  third  part  is  sold.  This 
is  a  very  plain  lesson  to  me,  that  my  editions  sell  for 
their  curiosity,  and  not  for  any  merit  in  them — and  so 

his  letters  ;  my  prediction  has  been  amply  verified.  He  wrote  a  great 
number  to  Bentley,  the  son  of  Dr.  Bentley,  who  ornamented  Gray's 
works  with  some  extraordinary  designs.  Walpole,  who  was  always 
proud  and  capricious,  observes  his  friend  Cole,  broke  with  Bentley 
because  he  would  bring  his  wife  with  him  to  Strawberry-hill.  He 
then  asked  Bentley  for  all  his  letters  back,  but  he  would  not  in  return 
give  Bentley's  own. 

This  whole  correspondence  abounded  with  literature,  criticism,  and 
wit  of  the  most  original  and  brilliant  composition.  This  ia  the 
opinion  of  no  friend,  but  an  admirer,  and  a  good  judge ;  for  it  was 
Bentley's  o,vn. 


70  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

Ihey  would  if  I  printed  Mother  Goose's  Tales,  and  but 
a  few.  If  I  am  humbled  as  an  author,  I  may  be  vaiu  as 
a  printer ;  and  when  one  has  nothing  else  to  be  vain 
of,  it  is  certainly  very  little  worth  while  to  be  proud  of 
that." 

There  is  a  distinction  between  the  author  of  great 
connexions  and  the  mere  author.  In  the  one  case,  the 
man  may  give  a  temporary  existence  to  his  books ;  but 
in  the  other,  it  is  the  book  which  gives  existence  to  the 
man. 

AYalpole's  writings  seem  to  be  constructed  on  a  certain 
principle,  by  which  he  gave  them  a  sudden,  rather  than 
a  lasting  existence.  In  historical  research  our  adven- 
turer startled  the  world  by  maintaining  paradoxes  which 
attacked  the  opinions,  or  changed  the  characters,  estab- 
lished for  centuries.  Singularity  of  opinion,  vivacity 
of  ridicule,  and  polished  epigrams  in  prose,  were  the 
means  by  which  Horace  \Yalpole  sought  distinction. 

In  his  works  of  imagination,  he  felt  he  could  not 
trust  to  himself — the  natural  pathetic  was  utterly  denied 
him.  But  he  had  fancy  and  ingenuity;  he  had  recourse 
to  the  marvellous  in  imagination  on  the  principle  he  had 
adopted  the  paradoxical  in  history.  Thus,  "  The  Castle 
of  Otranto,"  and  "  The  Mysterious  Mother,"  are  the 
productions  of  ingenuity  rather  than  genius;  and  dis- 
play the  miracles  of  art,  rather  than  the  spontaneous 
creations  of  nature. 

All  his  literary  works,  like  the  ornamented  edifice 
he  inhabited,  were  constructed  on  the  same  artificial 
principle  ;  an  old  paper  lodging-house,  converted  by  the 


THE    PAIN'S   OF   FASTIDIOUS   EGOTISM.  71 

magician  of  taste  into  a  Gothic  castle,  full  of  scenic 
effects.* 

"A  Catalogue  of  Royal  and  Noble  Authors"  was 
itself  a  classification  which  only  an  idle  amateur  could 
have  projected,  and  only  the  most  agreeable  narrator 
of  anecdotes  could  have  seasoned.  These  splendid 
scribblers  are  for  the  greater  part  no  authors  at  all.f 

His  attack  on  our  peerless  Sidney,  whose  fame  was 
more  mature  than  his  life,  was  formed  on  the  same  prin- 

*  This  is  the  renowned  Strawberry-hill,  a  villa  still  standing  on  the 
banks  of  the  Thames,  between  Teddington  and  Twickenham,  but  now 
despoiled  of  the  large  collection  of  pictures,  curiosities,  and  articles 
of  vertu  so  assiduously  collected  by  Walpole  during  a  long  life.  The 
ground  on  which  it  stands  was  originally  partially  occupied  by  a  small 
cottage,  built  by  a  nobleman's  coachman  for  a  lodging  house,  and 
occupied  by  a  toy- woman  of  the  name  of  Chevenix.  Hence  Walpole 
says  of  it,  in  a  letter  to  General  Conway,  "it  is  a  little  plaything  house 
that  I  got  out  of  Mrs.  Chevenix's  shop,  and  is  the  prettiest  bauble  you 
ever  saw." — Ed. 

f  Walpole's  characters  are  not  often  to  be  relied  on,  witness  his 
injustice  to  Hogarth  as  a  painter,  and  his  insolent  calumny  of  Charles 
I.  His  literary  opinions  of  James  I.  and  of  Sidney  might  have  been 
written  without  any  acquaintance  with  the  works  he  has  so  mali- 
ciously criticised.  In  his  account  of  Sidney  he  had  silently  passed 
over  the  "Defence  of  Poetry;"  and  in  his  second  edition  has  written 
this  avowal,  that  "he  had  forgotten  it;  a  proof  that  I  at  least  did  not 
think  it  sufficient  foundation  for  so  high  a  character  as  he  acquired." 
How  heartless  was  the  polished  cynicism  which  could  dare  to  hazard 
this  false  criticism  !  Nothing  can  be  more  imposing  than  his  volatile 
and  caustic  criticisms  on  the  works  of  James  the  I.,  yet  he  had 
probably  never  opened  that  folio  he  so  poignantly  ridicules.  He 
doubts  whether  two  pieces,  "The  Prince's  Cabala,"  and  "The  Duty 
of  a  King  in  his  Royal  Office,"  were  genuine  productions  of  James  I. 
The  truth  is  that  both  these  works  are  nothing  more  than  extracts 
printed  with  those  separate  titles  and  drawn  from  the  king's  "Basi- 
licon  Doron."  He  had  probably  neither  read  the  extracts  nor  the 
original. 


72  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

ciple  as  his  "  Historic  Doubts  "  on  Richard  HI.  Horace 
Walpole  was  as  willing  to  vilify  the  truly  great,  as  to 
beautify  deformity ;  when  he  imagined  that  the  fame 
he  was  destroying  or  conferring,  reflected  back  on  him- 
self. All  these  works  were  plants  of  sickly  delicacy, 
which  could  never  endure  the  open  air,  and  only  lived  in 
the  artificial  atmosphere  of  a  private  collection.  Yet  at 
times  the  flowers,  and  the  planter  of  the  flowers,  were 
roughly  shaken  by  an  uncivil  breeze. 

His  "Anecdotes  of  Painting  in  England"  is  a  most 
entertaining  catalogue.  He  gives  the  feelings  of  the 
distinct  eras  with  regard  to  the  arts ;  yet  his  pride  was 
never  gratified  when  he  reflected  that  he  had  been 
writing  the  work  of  Vertue,  who  had  collected  the 
materials,  but  could  not  have  given  the  philosophy. 
His  great  age  and  his  good  sense  opened  his  eyes  on 
himself;  and  Horace  "Walpole  seems  to  have  judged 
too  contemptuously  of  Horace  Walpole.  The  truth  is, 
he  was  mortified  he  had  not  and  never  could  obtain 
a  literary  peerage ;  and  he  never  respected  the  com- 
moner's seat.  At  these  moments,  too  frequent  in  his 
life,  he  contemns  authors,  and  returns  to  sink  back 
into  all  the  self-complacency  of  aristocratic  indiffer- 
ence. 

This  cold  unfeeling  disposition  for  literary  men,  this 
disguised  malice  of  envy,  and  this  eternal  vexation  at 
his  own  disappointments, — break  forth  in  his  corre- 
spondence with  one  of  those  literary  characters  with 
whom  he  kept  on  terms  while  they  were  kneeling  to 
him  in  the  humility  of  worship,  or  moved  about  to  fetch 


THE   PAINS   OF   FASTIDIOUS   EGOTISM.  73 

or   to   carry   his   little    quests  of  curiosity  in   town  or 
country.* 

The    following     literary    confessions     illustrate     this 

character : — 

"June,  1778. 

"  I  have  taken  a  thorough  dislike  to  being  an  author; 
and,  if  it  would  not  look  like  begging  you  to  compliment 
one  by  contradicting  me,  I  would  tell  you  what  I  am 
most  seriously  convinced  of,  that  I  find  what  small  share 
of  parts  I  had  grown  dulled.  And  when  I  perceive  it 
myself,  I  may  well  believe  that  others  would  not  be  less 
sharp-sighted.  It  is  very  natural ;  mine  were  spirits 
rather  than  parts  /  and  as  time  has  rebated  the  one,  it 
must  surely  destroy  their  resemblance  to  the  other." 

In  another  letter  : — 

"I  set  very  little  value  on  myself;  as  a  man,  I  am  a 
very  faulty  one  ;  and  as  an  author,  a  very  middling  one, 
which  whoever  thinks  a  comfortable  rank,  is  not  at  all  of 
my  opinion.     Pray  convince  me  that  you  think  I  mean 

*  It  was  such  a  person  as  Cole  of  Milton,  his  correspondent  of 
forty  years,  who  lived  at  a  distance,  and  obsequious  to  his  wishes, 
always  looking  up  to  him,  though  never  with  a  parallel  glance — with 
whom  he  did  not  quarrel,  though  if  "Walpole  could  have  read  the 
private  notes  Cole  made  in  his  MSS.  at  the  time  lie  was  often  writing 
the  civilest  letters  of  admiration, — even  Cole  would  have  been  cashiered 
from  his  correspondence.  Walpole  could  not  endure  equality  in 
literary  men.  Bentley  observed  to  Cole,  that  "Walpole's  pride  and 
hauteur  were  excessive:  which  betrayed  themselves  in  the  treatment 
of  Gray  who  had  himself  too  much  pride  and  spirit  to  forgive  it  when 
matters  were  made  up  between  them,  and  Walpole  invited  Gray  to 
Strawberry-hill.  "When  Gray  came,  he,  without  any  ceremony,  told 
"Walpole  that  though  he  waited  on  him  as  civility  required,  yet  by  no 
means  would  he  ever  be  there  on  ike  terms  of  their  former  friendship, 
which  he  had  totally  cancelled. — From  Cole's  MSS. 


7i  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

sincerely,  by  not  answering  me  with  a  compliment.  It 
is  very  weak  to  be  pleased  with  Jlattery;  the  stupidest 
of  all  delusions  to  beg  it.  From  you  I  should  take  it  ill. 
We  have  known  one  another  almost  forty  years.'' 

There  were  times  when  Horace  Walpole's  natural  taste 
for  his  studies  returned  with  all  the  vigour  of  passion — 
but  his  volatility  and  his  desultory  life  perpetually  scat- 
tered his  firmest  resolutions  into  air.  This  conflict 
appears  beautifully  described  when  the  view  of  King's 
College,  Cambridge,  throws  his  mind  into  meditation ; 
and  the  passion  for  study  and  seclusion  instantly  kindled 
his  emotions,  lasting,  perhaps,  as  long  as  the  letter  which 
describes  them  occupied  in  writing. 

"May  22,  1777 

"  The  beauty  of  King's  College,  Cambridge,  now  it  is 
restored,  penetrated  me  with  a  visionary  longing  to  be  a 
monk  in  it.  Though  my  life  has  been  passed  in  turbu- 
lent scenes,  in  pleasures  or  other  pastimes,  and  in  much 
fashionable  dissipation,  still,  books,  antiquity,  and  virtue 
kept  hold  of  a  corner  of  my  heart :  and  since  necessity 
has  forced  me  of  late  years  to  be  a  man  of  business,  my 
disposition  tends  to  be  a  recluse  for  what  remains — but 
it  will  not  be  my  lot  ;  and  though  there  is  some  excuse 
for  the  young  doing  what  they  like,  I  doubt  an  old  man 
should  do  nothing  but  what  he  ought,  and  I  hope  doing 
one's  duty  is  the  best  preparation  for  death.  Sitting 
with  one's  arms  folded  to  think  about  it,  is  a  very  long 
way  for  preparing  for  it.  If  Charles  V.  had  resolved  to 
make  some  amends  for  Ins  abominable  ambition  by  doing 
good  (his  duty  as  a  king),  there  would  have  beeu  infi- 


THE   PAINS   OF  FASTIDIOUS   EGOTISM.  75 

nitely  more  merit  than  going  to  doze  in  a  convent.  One 
may  avoid  actual  guilt  in  a  sequestered  life,  but  the 
virtue  of  it  is  merely  negative;  the  innocence  is 
beautiful." 

There  had  been  moments  when  Horace  Walpole  even 
expressed  the  tenderest  feelings  for  fame  ;  and  the  follow- 
ing passage,  written  prior  to  the  preceding  ones,  gives 
no  indication  of  that  contempt  for  literary  fame,  of  which 
the  close  of  this  character  will  exhibit  an  extraordinary 
instance. 

This  letter  relates  an  affecting  event — he  had  just 
returned  from  seeing  General  Conway  attacked  by 
a  paralytic  stroke.  Shocked  by  his  appearance,  he 
writes — 

"It  is,  perhaps,  to  vent  my  concern  that  I  write.  It 
has  operated  such  a  revolution  on  my  mind,  as  no  time, 
at  my  age,  can  efface.  It  has  at  once  damped  every 
pursuit  which  my  spirits  had  even  now  prevented  me 
from  being  weaned  from,  I  mean  of  virtu.  It  is  like  a 
mortal  distemper  in  myself;  for  can  amusements  amuse, 
if  there  is  but  a  glimpse,  a  vision  of  outliving  one's 
friends  ?  I  have  had  dreams  in  which  I  thought  I  wished 
for  fame — it  was  not  certainly  posthumous  fame  at  any 
distance  ;  I  feel,  I  feel  it  was  confined  to  the  memory  of 
those  Hove.  It  seems  to  me  impossible  for  a  man  who 
has  no  friends  to  do  anything  for  fame — and  to  me  the 
first  position  in  friendship  is,  to  intend  one's  friends  should 
survive  one — but  it  is  not  reasonable  to  oppress  you, 
who  are  suffering  gout,  with  my  melancholy  ideas. 
What  I  have  said  will  tell  you,  what  I  hope  so  many 


76  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

years  have  told  you,  that  I  am  very  constant  and  sincere 
to  friends  of  above  forty  years." 

In  a  letter  of  a  later  date  there  is  a  remarkable  confes- 
sion, which  harmonises  with  those  already  given. 

"My  pursuits  have  always  been  light,  trilling,  and 
tended  to  nothing  but  my  casual  amusement.  I  will  not 
say,  without  a  little  vain  ambition  of  showing  some  parts, 
but  never  with  industry  sufficient  to  make  me  apply  to 
anything  solid.  My  studies,  if  they  could  be  called  so, 
and  my  productions,  were  alike  desultory.  In  my  latter 
age  I  discovered  the  futility  both  of  my  objects  and  wri- 
tings— I  felt  how  insignificant  is  the  reputation  of  an 
author  of  mediocrity ;  and  that,  being  no  genius,  I  only 
added  one  name  more  to  a  list  of  writers  ;  but  had  told  the 
world  nothing  but  what  it  could  as  well  be  without.  These 
reflections  were  the  best  proofs  of  my  sense  ;  and  when 
I  could  see  through  my  own  vanity,  there  is  less  wonder 
in  my  discovering  that  such  talents  as  I  might  have  had 
are  impaired  at  seventy-two." 

Thus  humbled  was  Horace  Walpole  to  himself! — there 
is  an  intellectual  dignity,  which  this  man  of  wit  and 
tense  was  incapable  of  reaching — and  it  seems  a  retribu- 
tion that  the  scorner  of  true  greatness  should  at  length 
feel  the  poisoned  chalice  return  to  his  own  lips.  He  who 
had  contemned  the  eminent  men  of  former  times,  and 
quarrelled  with  and  ridiculed  every  contemporary  genius  ; 
who  had  affected  to  laugh  at  the  literary  fame  he  could 
not  obtain, — at  length  came  to  scorn  himself!  and  en- 
dured "  the  penal  fires  "  of  an  author's  hell,  in  undervalu- 
ing his  own  works,  the  productions  of  a  long  life  ! 


THE   PAINS   OF    FASTIDIOUS   EGOTISM.  77 

The  chagrin  and  disappointment  of  such  an  author 
•were  never  less  carelessly  concealed  than  in  the  follow- 
ing extraordinary  letter: — 


HORACE    WALrOLE    TO 

"Arlington  Street,  April  27,  1773. 
"Mr.  Gough  wants  to  be  introduced  to  me !  Indeed  ! 
I  would  see  him,  as  he  has  been  midwife  to  Masters  ;  but 
he  is  so  dull  that  he  would  only  be  troublesome — and  be- 
sides, you  know  I  shun  authors,  and  would  never  have 
been  one  myself,  if  it  obliged  me  to  keep  such  bad 
company.  They  are  always  in  earnest,  and  think  their 
profession  serious,  and  dwell  upon  trifles,  and  reverence 
learning.  I  laugh  at  all  these  things,  and  write  only  to 
laugh  at  them  and  divert  myself.  None  of  us  are  authors 
of  any  consequence,  and  it  is  the  most  ridiculous  of  all 
vanities  to  be  vain  of  being  mediocre.  A  page  in  a  great 
author  humbles  me  to  the  dust,  and  the  conversation  of 
those  that  are  not  superior  to  myself  reminds  me  of  what 
will  be  thought  of  myself.  I  blush  to  flatter  them,  or  to 
■  be  flattered  by  them ;  and  should  dread  letters  being 
published  some  time  or  other,  in  which  they  would  relate 
our  interviews,  and  we  shoidd  appear  like  those  puny 
conceited  witlings  in  Shenstone's  and  Hughes's  correspon- 
dence, who  give  themselves  airs  from  being  in  possession 
of  the  soil  of  Parnassus  for  the  time  being  ;  as  peers  are 
proud  because  they  enjoy  the  estates  of  great  men  who 
went  before  them.  Mr.  Gough  is  very  welcome  to  see 
Strawberry-hill,  or  I  would  help  him  to  any  scraps  in  my 
possession  that  would  assist  his  publications,  though  he 


78  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

is  one  of  those  industrious  who  are  onlv  re-burvin<;  the 
dead — hut  I  cannot  be  acquainted  with  him  ;  it  is  con- 
trary to  my  system  and  my  humour ;  and  besides  I  know 
nothing  of  barrows  and  Danish  entrenchments,  and  Saxon 
barbarisms  and  Phoenician  characters — in  short,  I  know 
nothing  of  those  ages  that  knew  nothing — then  how 
should  I  be  of  use  to  modern  literati?  All  the  Scotch 
metaphysicians  have  sent  me  their  works.  I  did  not  read 
one  of  them,  because  I  do  not  understand  what  is  not 
understood  by  those  that  write  about  it ;  and  I  did  not 
get  acquainted  with  one  of  the  writers.  I  should  like  to 
be  intimate  with  Mr.  Anstey,  even  though  he  wrote  Lord 
Buckhorse,  or  with  the  author  of  the  Heroic  Epistle — I 
have  no  thirst  to  know  the  rest  of  my  contemporaries, 
from  the  absurd  bombast  of  Dr.  Johnson  down  to  the 
silly  Dr.  Goldsmith,  though  the  latter  changeling  has  had 
bright  gleams  of  parts,  and  the  former  had  sense,  till  he 
changed  it  for  words,  and  sold  it  for  a  pension.  Don't 
think  me  scornful.  Recollect  that  I  have  seen  Pope,  and 
lived  with  Gray. — Adieu  !" 

Such  a  letter  seems  not  to  have  been  written  by  a  lit-" 
erary  man — it  is  the  babble  of  a  thoughtless  wit  and  a 
man  of  the  world.  But  it  is  worthy  of  him  whose  con- 
tracted heart  could  never  open  to  patronage  or  friend- 
ship. From  such  we  might  expect  the  unfeeling  ol 
vation  in  the  "  Anecdotes  of  Painting,"  that  "  want  of 
patronage  is  the  apology  for  want  of  genius.  Milton 
and  La  Fontaine  did  Dot  write  in  the  bask  of  court 
favour.  A  poet  or  a  painter  may  want  an  equipage  or  a 
villa,  by  wanting  protection;  they  can  always  afford  to 


THE    PAIN   OF  FASTIDIOUS   EGOTISM.  79 

Duy  ink  and  paper,  colours  and  pencil.  Mr.  Hogarth  has 
received  no  honours,  but  universal  admiration."  Patron 
age,  indeed,  cannot  convert  dull  men  into  men  of  genius, 
but  it  may  preserve  men  of  genius  from  becoming  dull 
men.  It  might  have  afforded  Dryden  that  studious 
leisure  which  he  ever  wanted,  and  which  would  have 
given  us  not  imperfect  tragedies,  and  uncorrected  poems, 
but  the  regulated  flights  of  a  noble  genius.  It  might 
have  animated  Gainsborough  to  have  created  an  English 
school  in  landscape,  which  I  have  heard  from  those  who 
knew  him  was  his  favourite  yet  neglected  pursuit.  But 
Walpole  could  insult  that  genius,  which  he  wanted  the 
generosity  to  protect ! 

The  whole  spirit  of  this  man  was  penury.  Enjoying 
an  affluent  income  he  only  appeared  to  patronise  the  arts 
which  amused  his  tastes, — employing  the  meanest  ai-tists, 
at  reduced  prices,  to  ornament  his  own  works,  an  economy 
which  he  bitterly  reprehends  in  others  who  were  com- 
pelled to  practise  it.  He  gratified  his  avarice  at  the 
expense  of  his  vanity ;  the  strongest  passion  must  prevail. 
It  was  the  simplicity  of  childhood  in  Chatterton  to 
imagine  Horace  Walpole  could  be  a  patron — but  it  is 
melancholy  to  record  that  a  slight  protection  might  have 
saved  such  a  youth.  Gray  abandoned  this  man  of  birth 
and  rank  in  the  midst  of  their  journey  through  Europe  ; 
Mason  broke  with  him  ;  even  his  humble  correspondent 
Cole,  this  "  friend  of  forty  years,"  was  often  sent  away  in 
dudgeon  ;  and  he  quarrelled  with  all  the  authors  and 
artists  he  had  ever  been  acquainted  with.  The  Gothic 
castle  at  Strawberry -hill  was  rarely  graced  with  living 


80  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

genius  —there  the  greatest  was  Horace  TTalpole  himself; 
but  he  had  been  too  lonsr  waiting  to  see  realised  a  niagd- 
eal  vision  of  his  hopes,  which  resembled  the  prophetic 
fiction  of  his  own  romance,  that  "  the  owner  should  grow 
too  large  for  his  house."  After  many  years,  having  dis- 
covered that  he  still  retained  his  mediocrity,  he  could 
never  pardon  the  presence  of  that  preternatural  being 
whom  the  world  considered  a  great  max. — Such  was 
the  feeling  which  dictated  the  close  of  the  above  letter; 
Johnson  and  Goldsmith  were  to  be  "  scorned,"  since 
Pope  and  Gray  were  no  more  within  the  reach  of  his 
envy  and  his  fear. 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM. 

"I  UNFRIENDLY  to  the  literary  character,  some  have 
^  imputed  the  brutality  of  certain  authors  to  their 
literary  habits,  when  it  may  be  more  truly  said  that 
they  derived  their  literature  from  their  brutality.  The 
spirit  Mas  envenomed  before  it  entered  into  the  fierce- 
ness of  literary  controversy,  and  the  insanity  was  in  the 
evil  temper  of  the  man  before  he  roused  our  notice  by 
his  ravings.  Ritson,  the  late  antiquary  of  poetry  (not  to 
call  him  poetical),  amazed  the  world  by  his  vituperative 
railing  at  two  authors  of  the  finest  taste  in  poetry, 
"Warton  and  Percy ;  he  carried  criticism,  as  the  discern- 
ing few  had  first  surmised,  to  insanity  itself;  the  char- 
acter before  us  only  approached  it. 

Dennis   attained  to  the  ambiguous  honour   of  being 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM.       81 

distinguished  as  "  The  Critic,"  and  he  may  yet  instruct 
us  how  the  moral  influences  the  literary  character,  and 
how  a  certain  talent  that  can  never  mature  itself  into 
genius,  like  the  pale  fruit  that  hangs  in  the  shade,  ripens 
only  into  sourness. 

As  a  critic  in  his  own  day,  party  for  some  time  kept 
him  alive ;  the  art  of  criticism  was  a  novelty  at  that 
period  of  our  literature.  He  flattered  some  great  men, 
and  he  abused  three  of  the  greatest ;  this  was  one  mode 
of  securing  popularity  ;  because,  by  this  contrivance, 
he  divided  the  town  into  two  parties ;  and  the  irascibility 
and  satire  of  Pope  and  Swift  were  not  less  serviceable  to 
him  than  the  partial  panegyrics  of  Dryden  and  Congreve. 
Johnson  revived  him,  for  his  minute  attack  on  Addison ; 
and  Kippis,  feebly  voluminous,  and  with  the  cold  affecta- 
tion  of  candour,  allows  him  to  occupy  a  place  in  our 
literary  history  too  large  in  the  eye  of  Truth  and  Taste. 

Let  us  say  all  the  good  we  can  of  him,  that  we  may 
not  be  interrupted  in  a  more  important  inquiry.  Dennis 
once  urged  fair  pretensions  to  the  office  of  critic.  Some 
of  his  "  Original  Letters,"  and  particularly  the  "  Remarks 
on  Prince  Arthur,"  written  in  his  vigour,  attain  even  to 
classical  criticism.*  Aristotle  and  Bossu  lay  open  before 
him,  and  he  developes  and  sometimes  illustrates  their 
principles  with   close  reasoning.      Passion   had  not  yet 

*  It  is  curious  to  observe  that  Kippis,  who  classifies  with  the  pomp 
of  enumeration  his  heap  of  pamphlets,  imagines  that,  as  Blackmore's 
Epic  is  consigned  to  oblivion,  so  likewise  must  be  the  criticism,  which, 
however,  he  confesses  he  could  never  meet  with.  An  odd  fate  at- 
tends Dennis's  works :  his  criticism  on  a  bad  work  ought  to  survive 
it,  as  gooQ  works  have  survived  his  criticisms. 
6 


82  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

blinded  the  young  critic  with  rage  ;  and  in  that  happy- 
moment,  Virgil  occupied  his  attention  even  more  than 
Blackmore. 

The  prominent  feature  in  his  literary  character  was 
good  sense ;  but  in  literature,  though  not  in  life,  good 
sense  is  a  penurious  virtue.  Dennis  could  not  be  car- 
ried beyond  the  cold  line  of  a  precedent,  and  before  he 
ventured  to  be  pleased,  he  was  compelled  to  look  into 
Aristotle.  His  learning  was  the  bigotry  of  literature. 
It  was  ever  Aristotle  explained  by  Dennis.  But  in  the 
explanation  of  the  obscure  text  of  his  master,  he  was 
led  into  such  frivolous  distinctions,  and  tasteless  propo- 
sitions, that  his  works  deserve  inspection,  as  examples 
of  the  manner  of  a  true  mechanical  critic. 

This  blunted  feeling  of  the  mechanical  critic  was  at 
first  concealed  from  the  world  in  the  pomp  of  critical 
erudition;  but  when  he  trusted  to  himself,  and,  desti- 
tute of  taste  and  imagination,  became  a  poet  and  a  dram- 
atist, the  secret  of  the  Royal  Midas  was  revealed.  As 
his  evil  temper  prevailed,  he  forgot  his  learning,  and  lost 
the  moderate  sense  which  he  seemed  once  to  have  pos- 
sessed. Rage,  malice,  and  dulness,  were  the  heavy  re- 
siduum ;  and  now  he  much  resembled  that  congenial 
soul  whom  the  ever-witty  South  compared  to  the  tailor's 
goose,  which  is  at  once  hot  and  heavy. 

Dennis  was  sent  to  Cambridge  by  his  father,  a  saddler, 
who  imagined  a  genius  had  been  born  in  the  family.  He 
travelled  in  France  and  Italy,  and  on  his  return  held  in 
contempt  every  pursuit  but  poetry  and  criticism.  He 
haunted  the  literary  coteries,  and  dropped  into  a  galaxy 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM.       §3 

of  wits  and  noblemen.  At  a  time  when  our  literature, 
like  our  politics,  was  divided  into  two  factions,  Dennis 
enlisted  himself  under  Dry  den  and  Congreve  ;*  and,  as 
legitimate  criticism  was  then  an  awful  novelty  in  the 
nation,  the  young  critic,  recent  from  the  Stagirite,  soon 
became  an  important,  and  even  a  tremendous  spirit. 
Pope  is  said  to  have  regarded  his  judgment;  and  Mallet, 
when  young,  tremblingly  submitted  a  poem,  to  live  or 
die  by  his  breath.  One  would  have  imagined  that  the 
elegant  studies  he  was  cultivating,  the  views  of  life 
which  had  opened  on  him,  and  the  polished  circle 
around,  would  have  influenced  the  grossness  which  was 
the  natural  growth  of  the  soil.  But  ungracious  Nature 
kept  fast  hold  of  the  mind  of  Dennis ! 

His  personal  manners  were  characterised  by  their 
abrupt  violence.  Once  dining  with  Lord  Halifax  he 
became  so  impatient  of  contradiction,  that  he  rushed 
out  of  the  room,  overthrowing  the  sideboard.  Inquiring 
on  the  next  day  how  he  had  behaved,  Moyle  observed, 
"  You  went  away  like  the  devil,  taking  one  corner 
of  the  house  with  you."  The  wits,  perhaps,  then  began 
to  suspect  their  young  Zoilus's  dogmatism. 

The  actors  refused  to  perform  one  of  his  tragedies  to 
empty  houses,  but  they  retained  some  excellent  thunder 

*  See  in  Dennis's  "  Original  Letters  "  one  to  Tonson,  entitled,  "  On 
the  conspiracy  against  the  reputation  of  Mr.  Dryden."  It  was  in 
favour  of  fully  against  wisdom,  weakness  against  power,  &c.  ;  Pope 
against  Dryden.  He  closes  with  a  well-turned  period.  "Wherever 
genius  runs  through  a  work,  I  forgive  its  faults;  and  wherever  that 
is  wanting,  no  beauties  can  touch  me.  Being  struck  by  Mr.  Dryden'3 
genius,  I  have  no  eyes  for  his  errors;  and  I  have  no  eyes  for  his  ene- 
mies' beauties,  because  I  am  not  struck  by  their  genius." 


84  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

which  Dennis  had  invented;  it  rolled  one  night  when 
Dennis  was  in  the  pit,  and  it  was  applauded  !  Suddenly 
starting  up,  he  cried  to  the  audience,  "By  G— ,  they 
wont  act  my  tragedy,  but  they  steal  my  thunder!" 
Thus,  when  reading  Pope's  "Essay  on  Criticism,"  he 
came  to  the  character  of  Appius,  he  suddenly  flung 
down  the  new  poem,  exclaiming,  "By  G— ,  he  means 
me  !"     He  is  painted  to  the  life. 

Lo  !  Appius  reddens  at  each  word  you  speak, 
And  stares  tremendous  with  a  threatening  eye, 
Like  some  fierce  tyrant  in  old  tapestrv. 

I  complete  this  picture  of  Dennis  with  a  very  extra- 
ordinary caricature,  which  Steele,  in  one  of  his  papers 
of  "The  Theatre,"  has  given  of  Dennis.  I  shall,  how- 
ever, disentangle  the  threads,  and  pick  out  what  I  con- 
sider not  to  be  caricature,  but  resemblance. 

"  His  motion  is  quick  and  sudden,  turning  on  all  sides, 
with  a  suspicion  of  every  object,  as  if  he  had  done  or 
feared  some  extraordinary  mischief.  You  see  wicked- 
ness in  his  meaning,  but  folly  of  countenance,  that 
betrays  him  to  be  unfit  for  the  execution  of  it.  He 
starts,  stares,  and  looks  round  him.  This  constant 
shuffle  of  haste  without  speed,  makes  the  man  thought 
a  little  touched;  but  the  vacant  look  of  his  two  eyes 
gives  you  to  understand  that  he  could  never  run  out 
of  his  wits,  which  seemed  not  so  much  to  be  .lost,  as  to 
want  employment ;  they  are  not  so  much  astray,  as  they 
are  a  wool-gathering.  He  has  the  face  and  surliness  ot 
a  mastiff'',  which  has  often  saved  him  from  being  treated 
like  a  cur,  till  some  more  sagacious  than  ordinary  found 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM.       85 

his  nature,  and  used  him  accordingly.  Unhappy  being  ! 
terrible  without,  fearful  within !  Not  a  wolf  in  sheep's 
clothing,  but  a  sheej)  in  a  wolf's."* 

However  anger  may  have  a  little  coloured  this  por- 
trait, its  truth  may  be  confirmed  from  a  variety  of  sources. 
If  Sallust,  with  his  accustomed  penetration  in  character- 
ising the  violent  emotions  of  Catiline's  restless  mind,  did 
not  forget  its  indication  in  "his  walk  now  quick  and 
now  slow,"  it  may  be  allowed  to  think  that  the  character 
of  Dennis  was  alike  to  be  detected  in  his  habitual  surliness. 

Even  in  his  old  age — for  our  chain  must  not  drop  a 
link — his  native  brutality  never  forsook  him.  Thomson 
and  Pope  charitably  supported  the  veteran  Zoilus  at  a 
benefit  play  ;  and  Savage,  who  had  nothing  but  a  verse 
to  give,  returned  them  very  poetical  thanks  in  the  name 
of  Dennis.  He  was  then  blind  and  old,  but  his  critical 
ferocity  had  no  old  age ;  his  surliness  overcame  every 
grateful  sense,  and  he  swore  as  usual,  "  They  could  be  no 
one's  but  that  fool  Savage's " — an  evidence  of  his  sa- 
gacity and  brutality  !f     This  was,  perhaps,  the  last  peev- 

*In  the  narrative  of  his  frenzy  (quoted  p.  88),  his  personnel  is  thus 
given.  "His  aspect  was  furious,  his  eyes  were  rather  fiery  than 
lively,  which  he  rolled  about  in  an  uncommon  manner.  He  often 
opened  his  mouth  as  if  he  would  have  uttered  some  matter  ot  impor- 
tance, but  the  sound  seemed  lost  inwardly.  His  beard  was  grown, 
which  they  told  me  he  would  not  suffer  to  be  shaved,  believing  the 
modern  dramatic  poets  had  corrupted  all  the  barbers  of  the  town  to 
take  the  first  opportunity  of  cutting  his  throat.  His  eyebrows  were 
grey,  long,  and  grown  together,  which  he  knit  with  indignation  when 
anything  was  spoken,  insomuch  that  he  seemed  not  to  have  smoothed 
his  forehead  for  many  years." — Ed. 

f  There  is  an  epigram  on  Dennis  by  Savage,  which  Johnson  has  pre- 
served in  his  Life ;  and  I  feel  it  to  be  a  very  correct  likeness,  although 


86  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

ish  snuff  shaken  from  the  dismal  link  of  criticism ;  for,  a 
few  days  after,  was  the  redoubted  Dennis  numbered  with 
the  mighty  dead. 

He  carried  the  same  fierceness  into  his  style,  and  com- 
mits the  same  ludicrous  extravagances  in  literary  compo- 
sition as  in  his  manners.  Was  Pope  really  sore  at  the 
Zoilian  style  ?  He  has  himself  spared  me  the  trouble  of 
exhibiting  Dennis's  gross  personalities,  by  having  col- 
lected them  at  the  close  of  the  Dunciad — specimens  which 
show  how  low  false  wit  and  malignity  can  get  to  by  hard 
pains.  I  will  throw  into  the  note  a  curious  illustration 
of  the  anti-poetical  notions  of  a  mechanical  critic,  who 
lias  no  wing  to  dip  into  the  hues  of  the  imagination.* 

Johnson  censures  Savage  for  writing  an  epigram  against  Dennis, 
■while  he  was  living  in  great  familiarity  with  the  critic.  Perhaps  that 
was  the  happiest  moment  to  write  the  epigram.  The  anecdote  in  the 
text  doubtless  prompted  "  the  fool  "  to  take  this  fair  revenge  and  just 
chastisement.  Savage  has  brought  out  the  features  strongly,  in  these 
touches — 

"  Say  what  revenge  on  Dennis  can  be  had, 

Too  dull  for  laughter,  for  reply  too  mad. 

On  one  so  poor  you  cannot  take  the  law, 

On  one  so  old  your  sword  you  scorn  to  draw. 

Uncaged  then,  let  the  harmless  monster  rage. 

Secure  in  dulness,  madness,  want,  and  age  !" 

*  Dennis  points  his  heavy  cannon  of  criticism  and  thus  bombards 
that  aerial  edifice,  the  li  Rape  of  the  Lock."  He  is  inquiring  into  the 
nature  of  poetical  machinery,  which,  he  oracularly  pronounces,  should 
be  religious,  or  allegorical,  or  political ;  asserting  the  "  Lutrin "  of 
Boileau  to  be  a  trifle  only  in  appearance,  covering  the  deep  political 
design  of  reforming  the  Popish  Church  ! — With  the  yard  of  criticism 
he  takes  measure  of  the  slender  graces  and  tiny  elegance  of  Pope's 
aerial  machines,  as  "  less  considerable  than  the  human  persons,  which 
is  without  precedent.  Nothing  can  be  so  contemptible  as  the  persons  or 
bo  foolish  as  the  understandings  of  these  Iwhgohlins.     Ariel's  speech  13 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM.       §7 

In  life  and  in  literature  we  meet  with  men  who  seem  en- 
dowed with  an  obliquity  of  understanding,  yet  active  and 
busy  spirits  ;  but,  as  activity  is  only  valuable  in  propor- 
tion to  the  capacity  that  puts  all  in  motion,  so,  when  ill- 
directed,  the  intellect,  warped  by  nature,  only  becomes 
more  crooked  and  fantastical.  A  kind  of  frantic  en- 
thusiasm breaks  forth  in  their  actions  and  their  language, 
and  often  they  seem  ferocious  when  they  are  only  foolish. 

one  continued  impertinence.  After  he  has  talked  to  them  of  black 
omens  and  dire  disasters  that  threaten  his  heroine,  those  bugbears 
dwindle  to  the  breaking  of  a  piece  of  china,  to  staining  a  petticoat,  the 
losing  a  fan,  or  a  bottle  of  sal  volatile — and  what  makes  Ariel's  speech 
more  ridiculous  is  the  place  where  it  is  spoken  on  the  sails  and  cord- 
age of  Belinda's  barge."  And  then  he  compares  the  Sylphs  to  tho 
Discord  of  Homer,  whose  feet  are  upon  the  earth,  and  head  in  the  skies. 
"  They  are,  indeed,  beings  so  diminutive  that  they  bear  the  same  pro- 
portion to  the  rest  of  the  intellectual  that  Eels  in  vinegar  do  to  the  rest 
of  the  material  world;  the  latter  are  only  to  be  seen  through  micro- 
scopes, and  the  former  only  through  the  false  optics  of  a  Rosicrucian 
understanding."  And  finally,  he  decides  that  "these  diminutive  be- 
ings are  only  Savmey  (that  is,  Alexander  Pope),  taking  the  change  : 
for  it  is  he,  a  little  lump  of  flesh,  that  talks,  instead  of  a  little  spirit." 
Dennis's  profound  gravity  contributes  an  additional  feature  of  the  bur- 
lesque to  these  heroi-comic  poems  themselves,  only  that  Dennis  cannot 
be  playful,  and  will  not  be  good-humoured. 

On  the  same  tasteless  principle  he  decides  on  the  improbability  of 
that  incident  in  the  "  Conscious  Lovers  "  of  Steele,  raised  by  Bevil, 
who,  having  received  great  obligations  from  his  father,  has  promised 
not  to  marry  without  his  consent.  On  this  Dennis,  who  rarely  in  his 
critical  progress  will  stir  a  foot  without  authority,  quotes  four  formida- 
ble pages  from  Locke's  "  Essay  on  Government,"  to  prove  that,  at  the 
age  of  discretion,  a  man  is  free  to  dispose  of  his  own  actions  1  One 
would  imagine  that  Dennis  was  arguing  like  a  special  pleader,  rather 
than  developing  the  involved  action  of  an  affecting  drama.  Are  there 
critics  who  would  pronounce  Dennis  to  be  a  very  sensible  brother  ?  It 
is  here  too  he  calls  Steele  "  a  twopenny  author,"  alluding  to  the 
price  of  the  "  Tatters  "-  -but  this  cost  Dennis  dear  1 


88  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

We  may  thus  account  for  the  manners  and  style  of 
Dennis,  pushed  almost  to  the  verge  of  insanity,  and  act- 
ing on  him  very  much  like  insanity  itself — a  circumstance 
which  the  quick  vengeance  of  wit  seized  on,  in  the  hu- 
morous "  Narrative  of  Dr.  Robert  Xorris,  concerning  the 
Frenzy  of  Mr.  John  Dennis,  an  officer  of  the  Custom- 
house."* 

It  is  curious  to  observe  that  Dennis,  in  the  definition  of 
genius,  describes  himself;  he  says — "  Genius  is  caused  by 
&  furious  joy  and  pride  of  soul  on  the  conception  of  an 
extraordinary  hint.  Many  men  have  their  hints  without 
their  motions  of  fury  and  pride  of  soul,  because  they 
want  fire  enough  to  agitate  their  spirits  ;  and  these  we 
call  cold  writers.  Others,  who  have  a  great  deal  of  fire, 
but  have  not  excellent  organs,  feel  the  fore-mentioned 
motions,  without  the  extraordinary  Jiints  ;  and  these  we 
call  fustian  writers."  His  motions  and  his  hints,  as  he 
describes  them,  in  regard  to  cold  or  fustian  writers,  seem 
to  include  the  extreme  points  of  his  own  genius. 

Another  feature  strongly  marks  the  race  of  the  Den- 

*  "The  narrative  of  the  frenzy  of  Mr.. John  Dennis,"  published  in 
the  Miscellanies  of  Pope.  Swift,  and  Arbuthnot,  and  said  to  have  been 
written  by  Pope,  is  a  grave  banter  on  his  usual  violence.  It  pro- 
fesses  to  be  the  account  of  the  physician  who  attended  him  at  the  re- 
quest of  a  servant,  who  describes  the  first  attack  of  his  madness  com- 
ing on  when  "  a  poor  simple  child  came  to  him  from  the  printers  ;  the 
boy  had  no  sooner  entered  the  room,  but  he  cried  out  'the  devil  was 
come  !'  "  The  constant  idiosyucra-y  he  had  that  his  writings  against 
France  and  the  Pope  might  endanger  his  liberty,  is  amusingly  hit  off; 
"he  perpetually  starts  and  runs  to  the  window  when  anyone  knocks, 
crying  out  "SdeathI  a  messenger  from  the  French  King;  I  shall  die 
in  the  Bajstile!'  " — Ed. 


INFLUENCE  OF  A  BAD  TEMPER  IN  CRITICISM.       S9 

nises.  "With  a  half-consciousness  of  deficient  genius,  they 
usually  idolize  some  chimera,  by  adopting  some  ex- 
travagant principle;  and  they  consider  themselves  as 
original  when  they  are  only  absurd. 

Dennis  had  ever  some  misshapen  idol  of  the  mind,  which 
he  was  perpetually  caressing  with  the  zeal  of  perverted 
judgment  or  monstrous  taste.  Once  his  frenzy  ran 
against  the  Italian  Opera;  and  in  his  "  Essay  on  Public 
Spirit,"  he  ascribes  its  decline  to  its  unmanly  warblings. 
I  have  seen  a  long  letter  by  Dennis  to  the  Earl  of  Ox- 
ford, written  to  congratulate  his  lordship  on  his  accession 
to  power,  and  the  high  hopes  of  the  nation  ;  but  the 
greater  part  of  the  letter  runs  on  the  Italian  Opera,  while 
Dennis  instructs  the  Minister  that  the  national  prosperity 
can  never  be  effected  while  this  general  corruption  of  the 
three  kingdoms  lies  open  ! 

Dennis  has  more  than  once  recorded  two  material  cir- 
cumstances in  the  life  of  a  true  critic  ;  these  are  his  ill- 
nature  and  the  public  neglect. 

"  I  make  no  doubt,"  says  he,  "  that  upon  the  perusal 
of  the  critical  part  of  these  letters,  the  old  accusation 
will  be  brought  against  me,  and  there  will  be  &  fresh  out- 
cry among  thoughtless  people  that  I  am  an  ill-natured 
man?"1 

He  entertained  exalted  opinions  of  his  own  powers,  and 
he  deeply  felt  their  public  neglect. 

"While  others,"  he  says  in  his  tracts,  "have  been  too 
much  encouraged,  I  have  been  too  much  neglected'''' — his 
favourite  system,  that  religion  gives  principally  to  great 
poetry  its  spirit  and  enthusiasm,  was  an  important  point, 


90  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

which,  he  says,  "  lias  been  left  to  be  treated  by  a  person 
who  has  the  honour  of  being  your  lordship's  countryman 
— your  lordship  knows  that  persons  so  much  and  so  long 
oppressed  as  I  have  been  have  been  always  allowed  to  say 
things  concerning  themselves  which  in  others  might  be 
offensive." 

His  vanity,  we  see,  was  equal  to  his  vexation,  and  as 
he  grew  old  he  became  more  enraged  ;  and,  writing  too 
often  without  Aristotle  or  Locke  by  his  side,  he  gave  the 
town  pure  Dennis,  and  almost  ceased  to  be  read.  "  The 
oppression  "  of  which  he  complains  might  not  be  less  im- 
aginary than  his  alarm,  while  a  treaty  was  pending  with 
France,  that  he  should  be  delivered  up  to  the  Grand 
Monarque  for  having  written  a  tragedy,  which  no  one 
could  read,  against  his  majesty. 

It  is  melancholy,  but  it  is  useful,  to  record  the  mortifi- 
cations of  such  authors.  Dennis  had,  no  doubt,  laboured 
with  zeal  which  could  never  meet  a  reward  ;  and,  per- 
haps, amid  his  critical  labours,  he  turned  often  with  an 
aching  heart  from  their  barren  contemplation  to  that  of 
the  tranquillity  he  might  have  derived  from  an  humbler 
avocation. 

It  was  not  literature,  then,  that  made  the  mind  coarse, 
brutalising  the  habits  and  inflaming  the  style  of  Dennis 
He  had  thrown  himself  anions  the  walks  of  genius,  and 
aspired  to  fix  himself  on  a  throne  to  which  Nature  had 
refused  him  a  legitimate  claim.  What  a  lasting  source 
of  vexation  and  rage,  even  for  a  longdived  patriarch  of 
criticism  ! 

Accustomed  to  suspend  the  scourge  over  the  heads  of 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  91 

the  first  authors  of  the  age,  he  could  not  sit  at  a  table  or 
enter  a  coffee-house  without  exerting  the  despotism  of  a 
literary  dictator.  How  could  the  mind  that  had  devoted 
itself  to  the  contemplation  of  masterpieces,  only  to  re- 
ward its  industry  by  detailing  to  the  public  their  human 
frailties,  experience  one  hour  of  amenity,  one  idea  of 
grace,  one  generous  impulse  of  sensibility  ? 

But  the  poor  critic  himself  at  length  fell,  really  more 
the  victim  of  his  criticisms  than  the  genius  he  had  in- 
sulted. Having  incurred  the  public  neglect,  the  blind 
and  helpless  Cacus  in  his  den  sunk  fast  into  contempt, 
dragged  on  a  life  of  misery,  and  in  his  last  days,  scarcely 
vomiting  his  fire  and  smoke,  became  the  most  pitiable 
creature,  receiving  the  alms  he  craved  from  triumphant 
genius. 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS 

TAKES    A    FATAL    DIRECTION    BY    ITS    ABUSE. 

"1  TOW  the  moral  and  literary  character  are  reciprocally 
-*-  -1-  influenced,  may  be  traced  in  the  character  of  a  per- 
sonage peculiarly  apposite  to  these  inquiries.  This  worthy 
of  literature  is  Orator  Henley,  who  is  rather  known  tra- 
ditionally than   historically.*      He   is   so   overwhelmed 

*  So  little  is  known  of  this  singular  man,  that  Mr.  Dibdin,  in  hi3 
very  curious  "  Bibliomania,"  was  not  able  to  recollect  any  other  de- 
tails than  those  he  transcribed  from  Warburton's  "  Commentary  on 
the  Dunciad."  In  Mr.  Nichols'  i;  History  of  Leicestershire"  a  more 
copious  account  of  Henley  may  be  found;  to  their  facts  something 


92  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

with  the  echoed  satire  of  Pope,  and  his  own  extravagant 
conduct  for  many  years,  that  I  should  not  care  to  extri- 
cate him,  had  I  not  discovered  a  feature  in  the  character 
of  Henley  not  yet  drawn,  and  constituting  no  inferior 
calamity  among  authors. 

Henley  stands  in  his  "  gilt  tub"  in  the  Dunciad  ;  and  a 
portrait  of  him  hangs  in  the  picture-gallery  of  the  Com- 
mentary. Pope's  verse  and  Warburton's  notes  are  the 
pickle  and  the  bandages  for  any  Egyptian  mummy  of 
dulness,  who  will  last  as  long  as  the  pyramid  that  en- 
closes him.  I  shall  transcribe,  for  the  reader's  conveni- 
ence, the  lines  of  Pope  : — 

Embrown'd  with  uativc  bronze,  lo !  Henley  stands, 
Tuning  his  voice,  and  balancing  his  hands  ; 
How  fluent  nonsense  trickles  from  his  tongue  I 
How  sweet  the  periods,  neither  said  nor  sung ! 
Still  break  the  benches,  Henley,  with  thy  strain, 
While  Sherlock,  Hare,  and  Gibson,  preach  in  vain. 
Oh  1  great  restorer  of  the  good  old  stage, 
Preacher  at  once,  and  Zany  of  thy  age  I  * 

It  will  surprise  when  I  declare  that  this  buffoon  was 
an  indefatigable  student,  a  proficient  in  all  the  learned 
languages,  an  elegant  poet,  and,  withal,  a  wit  of  no  in- 
ferior class.  It  remains  to  discover  why  "the  Preacher" 
became  "  the  Zany." 

is  here  added.  It  was,  however,  difficult  to  glean  after  so  excellent  a 
harvest-home.  To  the  author  of  the  "  Life  of  Bowyer,"  and  other 
works  devoted  to  our  authors,  our  literary  history  is  more  indebted, 
than  to  the  labours  of  any  other  contemporary.  He  is  the  Prosper 
Marchand  of  English  literature. 

*  It  is,  perhaps,  unnecessary  to  point  out  this  allusion  of  Pope  to 
our  ancient  mysterus.  where  the  Clergy  were  the  actors;  among 
which,  the  Vice  or  Punch  was  introduced.  (See  "Curiosities  of  Litera- 
ture.") 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  93 

Henley  Avas  of  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge,  and 
was  distinguished  for  the  ardour  and  pertinacity  of  his 
studies ;  he  gave  evident  marks  of  genius.  There  is  a 
letter  of  his  to  the  "  Spectator,"  signed  Peter  de  Quir, 
which  abounds  with  local  wit  and  quaint  humour.*  Ho 
had  not  attained  his  twenty-second  year  when  he  pub- 
lished a  poem,  entitled  "  Esther,  Queen  of  Persia,"  f  writ- 
ten amid  graver  studies  ;  for  three  years  after,  Henley, 
being  M.A.,  published  his  "Complete  Linguist,"  consist- 
ing of  grammars  of  ten  lanp-uacces. 

The  poem  itself  must  not  be  passed  by  in  silent  no- 
tice. It  is  preceded  by  a  learned  preface,  in  which  the 
poet  discovers  his  intimate  knowledge  of  oriental  studies, 
with  some  etymologies  from  the  Persic,  the  Hebrew,  and 
the  Greek,  concerning  the  name  and  person  of  Ahasuerus, 
whom  he  makes  to  be  Xerxes.  The  close  of  this  preface 
gives  another  unexpected  feature  in  the  character  of 
him  who,  the  poet  tells  us,  was  "  embrowned  with  native 
bronze" — an  unaffected  modesty !  Henley,  alluding  to 
a  Greek  paraphrase  of  Barnes,  censures  his  faults  with 
acrimony,  and  even  apologises  for  them,  by  thus  grace- 
fully closing  the  preface :  "  These  can  only  be  alle- 
viated by  one  plea,  the  youth  of  the  author,  which  is  a 
circumstance  I  hope  the  candid  will  consider  in  favour 
of  the  present  writer  ! " 

*  Specimens  of  Henley's  style  may  be  most  easily  referred  to  in 
the  "  Spectator,"  Nos.  94  and  518.  The  communication  on  punning, 
in  the  first;  and  that  of  judging  character  by  exteriors,  in  the  last; 
are  both  attributed  to  Henley. — Ed. 

f  The  title  is,  "  Esther,  Queen  of  Persia,  an  historical  Poem,  in  four 
books;  by  John  Henley,  B.  A.  of  St.  John's  College,  Cambridge.  1714." 


94  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

The  poem  is  not  destitute  of  imagination  and  har- 
mony. 

The  pomp  of  the  feast  of  Ahasuerus  has  all  the  luxuri- 
ance of  Asiatic  splendour;  and  the  circumstances  are 
selected  with  some  fancy. 

The  higher  guests  approach  a  room  of  state, 
Where  tissued  couches  all  around  were  set, 
Labour' d  with  art ;  o'er  ivory  tables  thrown, 
Embroider  d  carpets  fell  in  folds  adown. 
The  bowers  and  gardens  of  the  court  were  near, 
And  open  lights  indulged  the  breathing  air. 

Pillars  of  marble  bore  a  silken  sky, 

"While  cords  of  purple  and  fine  linen  tie 

In  silver  rings,  the  azure  canopy. 

Distinct  with  diamond  stars  the  blue  was  seen, 

And  earth  and  seas  were  feign'd  in  emerald  green ; 

A  globe  of  gold,  ray'd  with  a  pointed  crown, 

Form'd  in  the  midst  almost  a  real  sun. 

Nor  is  Henley  less  skilful  in  the  elegance  of  his  senti- 
ments, and  in  his  development  of  the  human  character, 
When  Esther  is  raised  to  the  throne,  the  poet  says — 

And  Esther,  though  in  robes,  is  Esther  still. 

And  then  sublimely  exclaims — 

The  heroic  soul,  amidst  its  bliss  or  woe, 

Is  never  swell'd  too  high,  nor  sunk  too  low; 

Stands,  like  its  origin  above  the  skies, 

Ever  the  same  great  self,  sedately  wise; 

Collected  and  prepared  in  every  stage 

To  scorn  a  courting  world,  or  bear  its  rage. 

"But  wit  which  the  "  Spectator"  has  sent  down  to  pos- 
terity, and  poetry  which  gave  the  promise  of  excellence, 
did  not  bound  the  noble  ambition  of  Henley;  ardent  in 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIU&  95 

more  important  labours,  lie  was  perfecting  himself  in  the 
learned  languages,  and  carrying  on  a  correspondence 
with  eminent  scholars. 

He  officiated  as  the  master  of  the  free-school  at  his 
native  town  in  Leicestershire,  then  in  a  declining  state ; 
but  he  introduced  many  original  improvements.  He 
established  a  class  for  public  elocution,  recitations  of  the 
classics,  orations,  &c. ;  and  arranged  a  method  of  en- 
abling every  scholar  to  give  an  account  of  his  studies 
without  the  necessity  of  consulting  others,  or  of  being 
examined  by  particular  questions.  These  miracles  are 
indeed  a  little  apocryphal ;  for  they  are  drawn  from 
that  pseudo-gospel  of  his  life,  of  which  I  am  inclined  to 
think  he  himself  was  the  evangelist.  His  grammar  of 
ten  languages  was  now  finished ;  and  his  genius  felt  that 
obscure  spot  too  circumscribed  for  his  ambition.  He 
parted  from  the  inhabitants  with  their  regrets,  and 
came  to  the  metropolis  with  thirty  recommendatory 
letters. 

Henley  probably  had  formed  those  warm  conceptions 
of  patronage  in  which  youthful  genius  cradles  its  hopes. 
Till  1724  he  appears,  however,  to  have  obtained  only  a 
small  living,  and  to  have  existed  by  translating  and 
writing.  Thus,  after  persevering  studies,  many  success- 
ful literary  efforts,  and  much  heavy  taskwork,  Henley 
found  he  was  but  a  hireling  author  for  the  booksellers, 
and  a  salaried  "  Hyp-doctor"  for  the  minister ;  for  he 
received  a  stipend  for  this  periodical  paper,  which  was 
to  cheer  the  spirits  of  the  people  by  ridiculing  the 
gloomy  forebodings  of  Amhurst's  "  Craftsman."     About 


96  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

this  time  the  complete  metamorphosis  of  the  studious 
and  ingenious  John  Henley  began  to  branch  out  into  its 
grotesque  figure  ;  and  a  curiosity  in  human  nature  was 
now  ahout  to  be  opened  to  public  inspection.  "The 
Preacher"  was  to  personate  "  The  Zany."  His  temper 
had  become  brutal,  and  he  had  gradually  contracted 
a  ferocity  and  grossness  in  his  manners,  which  seem  by 
no  means  to  have  been  indicated  in  his  purer  days. 
His  youth  was  disgraced  by  no  irregularities — it  was 
studious  and  honourable.  But  he  was  now  quick  at 
vilifying  the  greatest  characters ;  and  having  a  perfect 
contempt  for  all  mankind,  was  resolved  to  live  by 
making  one  half  of  the  world  laugh  at  the  other.  Such 
is  the  direction  which  disappointed  genius  has  too  often 
given  to  its  talents. 

He  first  affected  oratory,  and  something  of  a  theatrical 
attitude  in  his  sermons,  which  greatly  attracted  the 
populace  ;  and  he  startled  those  preachers  who  had  so 
long  dozed  over  their  own  sermons,  and  who  now  find- 
ing themselves  with  but  few  slumberers  about  them, 
envied  their  Ciceronian  brother, 

Tuning  his  voice,  and  balancing  his  hands. 

It  was  alleged  against  Henley,  that  "  he  drew  the 
people  too  much  from  their  parish  churches,  and  was 
not  so  proper  for  a  London  divine  as  a  rural  pastor." 
He  was  offered  a  rustication,  on  a  better  living;  but 
Henley  did  not  come  from  the  country  to  return 
to  it. 

There  is  a  narrative  of  the  life  of  Henley,  which,  sub- 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  97 

scribed  by  another  person's  name,  he  himself  inserted  in 
his  "  Oratory  Transactions."  *  As  he  had  to  publish 
himself  this  highly  seasoned  biographical  morsel,  and  as 
his  face  was  then  beginning  to  be  "  embrowned  with 
bronze,"  he  thus  very  impudently  and  very  ingtniously 
apologises  for  the  panegyric  : — 

"If  any  remark  of  the  writer  appears  favourable  to 
myself,  and  be  judged  apocryphal,  it  may,  however, 
weigh  in  the  opposite  scale  to  some  things  less  obliging- 
ly said  of  me ;  false  praise  being  as  pardonable  as  false 
reproach."f 

In  this  narrative  we  are  told,  that  when  at  college — 

"  He  began  to  be  uneasy  that  he  had  not  the  liberty 
of  thinking,  without  incurring  the  scandal  of  heterodoxy ; 
he  was  impatient  that  systems  of  all  sorts  were  put  into 
his  hands  ready  carved  out  for  him ;  it  shocked  him  to 
find  that  he  was  commanded  to  believe  against  his 
judgment,  and  resolved  some  time  or  other  to  enter  his 
protest  against  any  person  being  bred  like  a  slave,  who 
is  born  an  Englishman." 

This  is  all  very  decorous,  and  nothing  can  be  objected 
to  the  first  cry  of  this  reforming  patriot  but  a  reasonable 

*  Many  of  the  rough  drafts  of  his  famed  discourses  delivered  at  the 
Oratory  are  preserved  in  the  library  of  the  Guildhall,  Loudon.  The 
advertisements  he  drew  up  for  the  papers,  announcing  their  subjcctt 
are  generally  exceedingly  whimsical,  and  calculated  to  attract  popular 
attention. — Ed. 

f  This  narrative  is  subscribed  A..  Welstede.  "Warburton  malicious- 
ly quotes  it  as  a  life  of  Henley,  written  by  Welsted — doubtless  designed 
to  lower  the  writer  of  that  name,  and  one  of  the  heroes  of  the  Dunciad. 
The  public  have  long  been  deceived  by  this  artifice;  the  effect,  I 
believe,  of  "Warburton's  dishonesty. 
7 


98  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

suspicion  of  its  truth.  If  these  sentiments  -were  reallv 
in  his  mind  at  college,  he  deserves  at  least  the  praise 
of  retention :  for  fifteen  years  were  suffered  to  pass 
quietly  without  the  patriotic  volcano  giving  even  a 
distant  rumbling  of  the  sulphurous  matter  concealed 
beneath.  All  that  time  had  passed  in  the  contemplation 
of  church  preferment,  with  the  aerial  perspective  lighted 
by  a  visionary  mitre.  But  Henley  grew  indignant  at 
his  disappointments,  and  suddenly  resolved  to  reform 
"  the  gross  impostures  and  faults  that  have  long  prevail- 
ed in  the  received  institutions  and  establishments  of 
knowledge  and  religion'''' — simply  meaning  that  he 
wished  to  pull  down  the  Church  and  the  University  ! 

But  he  was  prudent  before  he  was  patriotic  ;  he  at 
first  grafted  himself  on  Whiston,  adopting  his  opinions, 
and  sent  some  queries  by  which  it  appears  that  Henley, 
previous  to  breaking  with  the  church,  was  anxious  to 
learn  the  power  it  had  to  punish  him.  The  Ariau 
"Whiston  was  himself,  from  pure  motives,  suffering  ex- 
pulsion from  Cambridge,  for  refusing  his  subscription  to 
the  Athanasian  Creed ;  he  was  a  pious  man,  and  no 
buffoon,  but  a  little  crazed.  Whiston  afterwards  dis- 
covered the  character  of  his  correspondent,  he  then 
requested   the  Bishop  of  London 

"  To  summon  Mr.  Henley,  the  orator,  whose  vile  his- 
tory 1  knew  so  well,  to  come  and  tell  it  to  the  church. 
But  the  bishop  said  he  could  do  nothing;  since  which 
time  Mr.  Henley  has  gone  on  for  about  twenty  years 
without  control  every  week,  as  an  ecclesiastical  mounte- 
bank, to  abuse  religion." 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  99 

The  most  extraordinary  project  was  now  formed  by 
Henley;  he  was  to  teach  mankind  universal  knowledge 
from  his  lectures,  and  primitive  Christianity  from  his 
sermons.  He  took  apartments  in  Newport  Market,  and 
opened  his  "  Oratory."     He  declared, 

"  He  would  teach  more  in  one  year  than  schools  and 
universities  did  in  five,  and  write  and  study  twelve 
hours  a-day,  and  yet  appear  as  untouched  by  the  yoke, 
as  if  he  never  bore  it." 

In  his  "  Idea  of  what  is  intended  to  be  taught  in  the 
Week-days'  Universal  Academy"  we  may  admire  the 
fertility,  and  sometimes  the  grandeur  of  his  views.  His 
lectures  and  orations*  are  of  a  very  different  nature  from 

*  Every  lecture  is  dedicated  to  some  branch  of  the  royal  family. 
Among  them  one  is  on  "University  Learning,"  an  attack. — "On  the 
English  History  and  Historians,"  extremely  curious. — "On  the  Lan- 
guages, Ancient  and  Modern,"  full  of  erudition — "On  the  English 
Tongue,"  a  valuable  criticism  at  that  moment  whenour  style  was  receiv- 
ing a  new  polish  from  Addison  and  Prior.  Henley,  acknowledging  that 
these  writers  had  raised  correctness  of  expression  to  its  utmost  height, 
adds,  though,  "  if  I  mistake  not,  something  to  the  detriment  of  that 
force  and  freedom  that  ought,  with  the  most  concealed  art,  to  be  a 
perfect  copy  of  nature  in  all  compositions."  This  is  among  the  first 
notices  of  that  artificial  style  which  has  vitiated  our  native  idiom, 
substituting  for  its  purity  an  affected  delicacy,  and  for  its  vigour  pro- 
fuse ornament.  Henley  observes  that,  "  to  be  perspicuous,  pure, 
elegant,  copious,  and  harmonious,  are  the  chief  good  qualities  of  writing 
the  Knglish  tongue;  they  are  attained  by  study  and  practice,  and  lost 
by  the  contrary:  but  imitation  is  to  be  avoided  ;  they  cannot  be  made 
our  own  but  by  keeping  the  force  of  our  understandings  superior  to 
our  models;  by  rendering  our  thoughts  Vie  original,  and  our  icords  the 
copy" — '  On  Wit  and  Imagination."  abounding  with  excellent  criti- 
cism.— '■  On  grave  conundrums  and  serious  buffoons,  in  defence  of 
burlesque  discourses,  from  the  most  weighty  authorities." — "A  Dis- 
sertation upou  Nonsense."     At  the  close  he  has  a  Ming  at  his  friend 


100  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

what  they  are  imagined  to  be ;  literary  topics  are  treated 
with  perspicuity  and  with  erudition,  and  there  is  some- 
thing original  in  the  manner.  They  were,  no  doubt, 
larded  and  stuffed  with  many  high-seasoned  jokes,  which 
Henley  did  not  send  to  the  printer. 

Henley  was  a  charlatan  and  a  knave ;  but  in  all  his 
charlatanerie  and  his  knavery  he  indulged  the  reveries 
of  genius;  many  of  which  have  been  realised  since;  and 
if  we  continue  to  laugh  at  Henley,  it  will  indeed  be  cruel, 
for  we  shall  be  laughing  at  ourselves!  Among  the  ob- 
jects which  Henley  discriminates  in  his  general  design, 
were,  to  supply  the  want  of  a  university,  or  universal 
school,  in  this  capital,  for  persons  of  all  ranks,  profes- 
sions, and  capacities  ; — to  encourage  a  literary  corre- 
spondence with  great  men  and  learned  bodies;  the 
communication  of  all  discoveries  and  experiments  in 
science  and  the  arts  ;  to  form  an  amicable  society  for  the 
encouragement  of  learning,  "in  order  to  cultivate,  adorn, 
and  exalt  the  genius  of  Britain  ;"  to  lay  a  foundation  for 

Pope;  it  was  after  the  publication  of  the  Dunciad.  "Of  Nonsense 
there  are  celebrated  professors;  Mr.  Pope  throws  witty  like  Bays  ic 
the  'Rehearsal,'  by  selling  bargains  (his  subscriptions  for  Homer), 
praising  himself,  laughing  at  his  joke,  and  making  his  own  works  the 
test  of  any  man's  criticism ;  but  he  seems  to  be  in  some  jeopardy ;  for 
the  ghost  of  Homer  has  lately  spoke  to  him  in  Greek,  and  Shakspeare 
resolves  to  bring  him,  as  he  has  brought  Sliakspeare,  to  a  tragical  con- 
clusion. Mr.  Pope  suggests  the  last  choice  of  a  subject  for  writing  a 
book,  by  making  the  Xoaseiise  of  others  his  argument ;  while  his  own 
puts  it  out  of  any  writer's  power  to  confute  him."  In  another  fling 
at  Pope,  he  gives  the  reason  why  Mr.  Pope  adds  the  dirty  dialect  to 
that  of  the  water,  and  is  in  love  with  the  Nymphs  of  Fleet  ditch;  and 
in  a  lecture  on  the  spleen  he  announced  u  an  anatomical  discovery, 
that  Mr.  Pope's  spleen  is  bigger  than  his  head!" 


DISAPPOINTED   GENIUS.  101 

an  English  Academy ;  to  give  a  standard  to  our  lan- 
guage, and  a  digest  to  our  history;  to  revise  the  ancient 
schools  of  philosophy  and  elocution,  which  last  has  been 
reckoned  by  Pancirollus  among  the  artes  perclitm.  All 
these  were  "  to  bring  all  the  parts  of  knowledge  into 
the  narrowest  compass,  placing  them  in  the  clearest 
light,  and  fixing  them  to  the  utmost  certainty."  The 
religion  of  the  Oratory  was  to  be  that  of  the  primitive 
church  in  the  first  ages  of  the  four  first  general  councils, 
approved  by  parliament  in  the  first  year  of  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth.  "The  Church  of  England  is  really  with  us; 
we  appeal  to  her  own  principles,  and  we  shall  not 
deviate  from  her,  unless  she  deviates  from  herself."  Yet 
his  "Primitive  Christianity"  had  all  the  sumptuous 
pomp  of  popery ;  his  creeds  and  doxologies  are  printed 
in  the  red  letter,  and  his  liturgies  in  the  black;  his 
pulpit  blazed  in  gold  and  velvet  (Pope's  "  gilt  tub ") ; 
while  his  "  Primitive  Eucharist "  was  to  be  distributed 
with  all  the  ancient  forms  of  celebrating  the  sacrifice  of 
the  altar,  which  he  says,  "  are  so  noble,  so  just,  sublime, 
and  perfectly  harmonious,  that  the  change  has  been 
made  to  an  unspeakable  disadvantage."  It  was  restor- 
ing the  decorations  and  the  mummery  of  the  mass !  He 
assumed  even  a  higher  tone,  and  dispersed  medals,  like 
those  of  Louis  XIV.,  with  the  device  of  a  sun  near  the 
meridian,  and  a  motto,  Ad  swnma,  with  an  inscription 
expressive  of  the  genius  of  this  new  adventurer,  Inve- 
niam  viam  aut  faclam !  There  was  a  snake  in  the 
grass ;  it  is  obvious  that  Henley,  in  improving  literature 
and  philosophy,  had  a  deeper  design — to  set  up  a  new 


102  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

sect !  He  called  himself  "  a  Rationalist,"  and  on  his 
death-bed  repeatedly  cried  out,  "  Let  my  notorious 
enemies  know  I  die  a  Rational."  * 

His  address  to  the  townf  excited  public  curiosity  to 
the  utmost;  and  the  floating  crowds  were  repulsed  by 
their  own  violence  from  this  new  paradise,  where  "  The 
Tree  of  Knowledge "  was  said  to  be  planted.  At  the 
succeeding  meeting  "  the  Restorer  of  Ancient  Elo- 
quence" informed  "persons  in  chairs  that  they  must 
come  sooner."  He  first  commenced  by  subscriptions  to 
be  raised  from  "  persons  eminent  in  Arts  and  Literature," 
who,  it  seems,  were  lured  by  the  seductive  promise,  that, 
"if  they  had  been  virtuous  or  penitents,  they  should  be 
commemorated  ;"  an  oblique  hint  at  a  panegyrical  puff. 
In  the  decline  of  his  popularity  he  permitted  his  door- 
keeper, whom  he  dignifies  with  the  title  of  Ostiary,  to 
take  a  shilling !  But  he  seems  to  have  been  popular 
for  many  years ;  even  when  his  auditors  were  but  few, 
they  were  of  the  better  order;  J  and  in  notes  respecting 
him  which  I  have  seen,  by  a  contemporary,  he  is  called 
"the  reverend  and  learned."  His  favourite  character 
was  that  of  a  Restorer  of  Eloquence;  and  he  was  not 
destitute  of  the  qualifications  of  a  fine  orator,  a  good 
voice,  graceful  gesture,  and  forcible  elocution.  Warbur- 
ton  justly  remarked,  "  Sometimes  he  broke  jests,  and 


*  Thus  ho  anticipated  the  term,  since  become  so  notorious  among 
German  theologians. 

f  It  is  preserved  in  the  "Historical  Register,"  vol.  xi.  for  1726.  It 
is  curious  and  well  written. 

\  "Gentleman's  Magazine,"  voL  lvii.  p.  376. 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  103 

sometimes  that  bread  which  lie  called  the  Primitive 
Eucharist."  He  would  degenerate  into  buffoonery  on 
solemn  occasions.  His  address  to  the  Deity  was  at  first 
awful,  and  seemingly  devout ;  but,  once  expatiating  on 
the  several  sects  who  would  certainly  be  damned,  he 
prayed  that  the  Dutch  might  be  undamm\l!  He  under- 
took to  show  the  ancient  use  of  the  petticoat,  by  quoting 
the  Scriptures  where  the  mother  of  Samuel  is  said  to 
have  made  him  "a  little  coat"  ergo,  a  petti-co«£/*  His 
advertisements  were  mysterious  ribaldry  to  attract 
curiosity,  while  his  own  good  sense  would  frequently  chas- 

*  His  "  Defence  of  the  Oratory  "  is  a  curious  performance.  He  pre- 
tends to  derive  his  own  from  great  authority.  "  St.  Paul  is  related, 
Acts  28,  to  Lave  dwelt  two  whole  years  in  his  own  hired  house,  and  to 
have  received  all  that  came  in  unto  him,  teaching  those  things  which 
concern  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  with  all  confidence,  no  man  forbidding 
him.  This  was  at  Rome,  and  doubtless  was  his  practice  in  his  other 
travels,  there  being  the  same  reason  in  the  thing  to  produce  elsewhere 
the  like  circumstances."  He  proceeds  to  show  "  the  calumnies  and 
reproaches,  and  the  novelty  and  impiety,  with  which  Christianity,  at 
its  first  setting  out,  was  charged,  as  a  mean,  abject  institution,  not 
only  useless  and  unserviceable,  but  pernicious  to  the  public  and  it3 
professors,  as  the  refuse  of  the  world." — Of  the  false  accusations 
raised  against  Jesus — all  this  he  applies  to  himself  and  his  oratory — 
and  he  concludes,  that  "  Bringing  men  to  think  rightly  will  always  be 
reckoned  a  depraving  of  their  minds  by  those  who  are  desirous  to 
keep  them  in  a  mistake,  aud  who  measure  all  truth  by  the  standard 
of  their  own  narrow  opinions,  views,  and  passions.  The  principles  of 
this  institution  are  those  of  right  reason :  the  first  ages  of  Christian- 
ity ;  true  facts,  clear  criticism,  and  polite  literature — if  these  corrupt 
the  mind,  to  find  a  place  where  the  mind  will  not  be  corrupted  will  bo 
impracticable."  Thus  speciously  could  " the  Orator"  reason,  raising 
himself  to  the  height  of  apostolical  purity.  Aud  when  he  was  accused 
that  he  did  all  for  lucre,  he  retorted,  that  "some  do  nothing  for  it;" 
and  that  "he  preached  more  charity  sermons  than  any  clergyman  in 
the  kingdom." 


10-i  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

tise  those  who  could  not  resist  it ;  his  auditors  came  in 
folly,  but  they  departed  in  good-humour.*  These  ad- 
vertisements were  usually  preceded  by  a  sort  of  motto, 
generally  a  sarcastic  allusion  to  some  public  transaction 
of  the  preceding  week.f  Henley  pretended  to  great 
impartiality;  and  when  two  preachers  had  animadverted 
on  him,  he  issued  an  advertisement,  announcing,  "  A 
Lecture  that  will  be  a  challenge  to  the  Rev.  Mr.  Batty 
and  the  Rev.  Mr.  Albert.  Letters  are  sent  to  them  on 
this  head,  and  a  free  standing-place  is  there  to  be  had 
gratis."     Once  Henley  offered  to  admit  of  a  disputation, 

*  He  once  advertised  an  oration  on  marriage,  which  drew  together 
an  overflowing  assembly  of  female*,  at  which,  solemnly  shaking  his 
head,  he  told  the  ladies,  that  "  he  was  afraid,  that  oftentimes,  as  well 
as  now,  they  came  to  church  in  hopes  to  get  husbands,  rather  than  be 
instructed  by  the  preacher:"  to  which  he  added  a  piece  of  wit  not 
quite  decent.  He  congregated  the  trade  of  shoemakers,  by  offering  to 
show  the  most  expeditious  method  of  making  shoes :  ho  held  out  a 
boot,  and  cut  off  the  leg  part.  He  gave  a  lecture,  which  he  advertised 
was  "  for  the  instruction  of  those  who  do  not  like  it ;  it  was  on  tho 
philosophy,  history,  and  great  use  of  Nonsense  to  the  learned,  political, 
and  polite  world,  who  excel  in  it.'' 

f  Dr.  Cobden,  one  of  George  the  Second's  chaplains,  having,  in  1748, 
preached  a  sermon  at  St.  James's  from  these  words,  "  Take  away  the 
wicked  from  before  the  king,  and  his  throne  shall  be  established  in 
righteousness,"  it  gave  so  much  displeasure,  that  the  doctor  was 
ptruck  out  of  the  list  of  chaplains;  and  the  next  Saturday  the  follow- 
ing parody  of  his  text  appeared  as  a  motto  to  Henley's  advertise- 
ment: 

"  Away  with  the  wicked  before  the  king, 
And  away  with  the  wicked  behind  him ; 
His  throne  it  will  bless 
"With  righteousness, 
And  we  shall  know  where  to  find  him." 

Chalmers's  "  Biographical  Dictionary." 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  105 

and  that  he  would  impartially  determine  the  merits  of 
the  contest.  It  happened  that  Henley  this  was  over- 
matched ;  for  two  Oxonians,  supported  by  a  strong 
party  to  awe  his  "  marrow-boners,"  as  the  butchers 
were  called,  said  to  be  in  the  Orator's  pay,  entered  the 
list;  the  one  to  defend  the  ignorance,  the  other  the  impur 
deuce,  of  the  Restorer  of  Eloquence  himself.  As  there 
wTas  a  door  behind  the  rostrum,  which  led  to  his  house, 
the  Orator  silently  dropped  out,  postponing  the  award 
to  some  happier  day.* 

This  age  of  lecturers  may  find  their  model  in  Henley's 
"  Universal  Academy,"  and  if  any  should  aspire  to  bring 
themselves  down  to  his  genius,  I  furnish  them  with  hints 
of  anomalous  topics.  In  the  second  number  of  "The 
Oratory  Transactions,"  is  a  diary  from  July  1720,  to 
August  1728.  It  forms,  perhaps,  an  unparalleled  chroni- 
cle of  the  vagaries  of  the  human  mind.     These  archives 


*  The  history  of  the  closing:  years  of  Henley's  life  is  thus  given  in 
"The  History  of  the  Robin  Hood  Society,"  1764,  a  political  club, 
whose  debates  he  occasionally  enlivened: — "The  Orator,  with  vari- 
ous success,  still  kept  up  his  Oratory,  King  George's,  or  Charles's 
Chapel,  as  he  differently  termed  it,  till  the  year  1759,  when  he  died. 
At  its  first  establishment  it  was  amazingly  crowded,  and  money 
flowed  in  upon  him  apace ;  and  between  whiles  it  languished  and 
drooped:  but  for  some  years  before  its  author's  death  it  dwindled 
away  so  much,  and  fell  into  such  an  hectic  state,  that  the  few  friends 
of  it  feared  its  decease  was  very  near.  The  doctor,  indeed,  kept  it  up 
to  the  last,  determined  it  should  live  as  long  as  he  did,  and  actually  ex- 
hibited many  evenings  to  empty  benches.  Finding  no  one  at  length 
would  attend,  he  admitted  the  acquaintances  of  his  door-keeper,  run- 
ner, mouth-piece,  and  some  other  of  his  followers,  gratis.  On  the  13th 
of  October,  however,  the  doctor  died,  and  the  Oratory  ceased ;  no  one 
having  iniquity  or  impudence  sufficient  to  continue  it  on." — Ed. 


106  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

of  cunning,  of  folly,  and  of  literature,  are  divided  into 
two  diaries  ;  the  one  "  The  Theological  or  Lord's  days' 
subjects  of  the  Oratory ;"  the  other,  "  The  Academical 
or  Week-days'  subjects."  I  can  only  note  a  few.  It  is 
easy  to  pick  out  ludicrous  specimens ;  for  he  had  a 
quaint  humour  peculiar  to  himself;  but  among  these 
numerous  topics  are  many  curious  for  their  knowledge 
and  ingenuity. 

"  The  last  Wills  and  Testaments  of  the  Patriarchs." 

"An  Argument  to  the  Jews,  with  a  proof  that  they 
ought  to  be  Christians,  for  the  same  reason  which  they 
ought  to  be  Jews." 

"  St.  Paul's  Cloak,  Books,  and  Parchments,  left  at 
Troas." 

"  The  tears  of  Magdalen,  and  the  joy  of  angels." 

"  New  Converts  in  Religion."     After  pointing  out  the 

names  of  "  Courayer  and  others,  the  D of  W n, 

the  Protestantism  of  the  P ,  the  conversion  of  the 

Rev.   Mr.   B e,  and  Mr.  Har y,"  he  closes  with 

"  Origen's  opinion  of  Satan's  conversion  ;  with  the  choice 
and  balance  of  Religion  in  all  countries." 

There  is  one  remarkable  entry  : — 

"Feb.  11.  This  week  all  Mr.  Henley's  writings  were 
seized,  to  be  examined  by  the  State.  Vide  Magnam 
Chartam,  and  Eng.  Lib." 

It  is  evident  by  what  follows  that  the  personalities  he 
made  use  of  were  one  means  of  attracting  auditors. 

"  On  the  action  of  Cicero,  and  the  beauty  of  Elo- 
quence, and  on  living  characters ;  of  action  in  the  Sen- 
ate, at  the  Bar,  and  in  the  Pulpit — of  the  Theatrical  in 


DISAPPOINTED    GENIUS.  107 

all  men.     The  manner  of  my  Lord ,  Sir ,  Dr. 

,  the  B.  of ,  being  a  proof  how  all  life  is  playing 

something,  but  with  different  aetion." 

In  a  Lecture  on  the  History  of  Bookcraft,  an  account 
was  given 

"  Of  the  plenty  of  books,  and  dearth  of  sense  ;  the 
advantages  of  the  Oratory  to  the  booksellers,  in  adver- 
tising for  them ;  and  to  their  customers,  in  making 
books  useless ;  with  all  the  learning,  reason,  and  wit 
more  than  are  proper  for  one  advertisement." 

Amid  these  eccentricities  it  is  remarkable  that  "the 
Zany"  never  forsook  his  studies ;  and  the  amazing  multi- 
plicity of  the  MSS.  he  left  behind  him  confirm  this  ex- 
traordinary fact.  "  These,"  he  says,  "  are  six  thousand 
more  or  less,  that  I  value  at  one  guinea  apiece ;  with 
150  volumes  of  commonplaces  of  wit,  memoranda,"  &c. 
They  were  sold  for  much  less  than  one  hundred  pounds  ; 
I  have  looked  over  many ;  they  are  written  with  great 
care.  Every  leaf  has  an  opposite  blank  page,  probably 
left  for  additions  or  corrections,  so  that  if  his  nonsense 
were  spontaneous,  his  sense  was  the  fruit  of  study  and 
correction. 

Such  was  "  Orator  Henley !"  A  scholar  of  great  ac- 
quirements, and  of  no  mean  genius ;  hardy  and  inven- 
tive, eloquent  and  witty ;  he  might  have  been  an  orna- 
ment to  literature,  which  he  made  ridiculous;  and  the 
pride  of  the  pidpit,  which  he  so  egregiously  disgraced ; 
but,  having  blunted  and  worn  out  that  interior  feeling, 
which  is  the  instinct  of  the  good  man,  and  the  wisdom 
of  the  wise,  there  was  no  balance  in  his  passions,  and  the 


108  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

decorum  of  life  was  sacrificed  to  its  selfishness.  He  con- 
descended to  live  on  the  follies  of  the  people,  and  his 
sordid  nature  had  changed  him  till  he  crept,  "  licking 
the  dust  with  the  serpent."* 


THE  MALADIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

r  I  ^IIE  practice  of  every  art  subjects  the  artist  to  some 
particular  inconvenience,  usually  inflicting  some 
malady  on  that  member  which  has  been  over-wrought 
by  excess:  nature  abused,  pursues  man  into  his  most 
secret  corners,  and  avenges  herself.  In  the  athletic  exer- 
cises of  the  ancient  Gymnasium,  the  pugilists  were  ob- 
served to  become  lean  from  their  hips  downwards,  while 
the  superior  parts  of  their  bodies,  which  they  over- 
exercised,  were  prodigiously  swollen ;  on  the  contrary, 
the  racers  were  meagre  upwards,  while  their  feet 
acquired  an  unnatural  dimension.  The  secret  source  of 
life  seems  to  be  carried  forwards  to  those  parts  which 
are  making  the  most  continued  efforts. 

In  all  sedentary  labours,  some  particular  malady  is 
contracted  by  every  worker,  derived  from  particular  pos- 

*  Hogarth  has  preserved  his  features  in  the  parson  who  figures  so 
conspicuously  in  his  ''Modern  Midnight  Conversation."  His  off-hand 
style  of  discourse  is  given  in  the  Cray's  Inn  Journal,  1753  (Xo.  18),  in 
an  imaginary  meeting  of  the  political  Robin  Hood  Society,  where  he 
figures  as  Orator  Bronze,  and  exclaims: — "I  am  pleased  to  see  this 
assembly — you're  a  twig  from  me;  a  chip  of  the  old  block  at  Clare 
Market; — I  am  the  old  block,  invincible;  coup  de  grace  as  yet  unan- 
swered. We  are  brother  rationalists;  logicians  upon  fundamentals! 
I  love  ye  all — I  love  mankind  in  general — give  me  some  of  that  por- 
ter."— Ed. 


TIIE    MALADIES   OF   AUTHORS.  1Q9 

tures  of  the  body  and  peculiar  habits.  Tims  the  weaver, 
the  tailor,  the  painter,  and  the  glass-blower,  have  all 
their  respective  maladies.  The  diamond-cutter,  with  a 
furnace  before  him,  may  be  said  almost  to  live  in  one  ; 
the  slightest  air  must  be  shut  out  of  the  apartment,  lest  it 
scatter  away  the  precious  dust — a  breath  would  ruin  him  ! 

The  analogy  is  obvious  ;*  and  the  author  must  partici- 
pate in  the  common  fate  of  all  sedentary  occupations. 
But  his  maladies,  from  the  very  nature  of  the  delicate 
organ  of  thinking,  intensely  exercised,  are  more  terrible 
than  those  of  any  other  profession ;  they  are  more  com- 
plicated, more  hidden  in  their  causes,  and  the  mysterious 
union  and  secret  influence  of  the  faculties  of  the  soul 
over  those  of  the  body,  are  visible,  yet  still  incompre- 
hensible ;  they  frequently  produce  a  perturbation  in  the 
faculties,  a  state  of  acute  irritability,  and  many  sorrows 
and  infirmities,  which  are  not  likely  to  create  much  sym- 
pathy from  those  around  the  author,  who,  at  a  glance, 
could  have  discovered  where  the  pugilist  or  the  racer 
became  meagre  or  monstrous :  the  intellectual  malady 
eludes  even  the  tenderness  of  friendship. 

The  more  obvious  maladies  engendered  by  the  life  of 
a  student  arise  from  over-study.  These  have  furnished 
a  curious  volume  to  Tissot,  in  his  treatise  "  On  the 
Health  of  Men  of  Letters ;"  a  book,  however,  which 
chills  and  terrifies  more  than  it  does  ccood. 


*  Hawkesworth,  in  the  second  paper  of  the  "  Adventurer,"  has 
composed,  from  his  own  feelings,  an  elegant  description  of  intel- 
lectual and  corporeal  labour,  and  the  sufferings  of  an  author,  with  tho 
uncertainty  of  his  labour  and  his  reward. 


HO  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

The  unnatural  fixed  postures,  the  perpetual  activity 
of  the  mind,  and  the  inaction  of  the  body ;  the  brain 
exhausted  with  assiduous  toil  deranging  the  nerves, 
vitiating  the  digestive  powers,  disordering  its  own 
machinery,  and  breaking  the  calm  of  sleep  by  that  pre- 
vious state  of  excitement  which  study  throws  us  into, 
are  some  of  the  calamities  of  a  studious  life :  for  like  the 
ocean  when  its  swell  is  subsiding,  the  waves  of  the  mind 
too  still  heave  and  beat ;  hence  all  the  small  feverish 
symptoms,  and  the  whole  train  of  hypochondriac  affec- 
tions, as  well  as  some  acute  ones.* 

*  Dr.  Fuller's  "  Medicina  Gymnastica,  or,  a  treatise  concerning  the 
power  of  Exercise,  with  respect  to  the  Animal  (Economy,  fifth  edi- 
tion, 1718,"  is  useful  to  remind  the  student  of  what  he  is  apt  to  for- 
get ;  for  the  object  of  this  volume  is  to  substitute  exercise  for  medicine. 
He  wrote  the  book  before  he  became  a  physician.  He  considers 
horse-riding  as  the  best  and  noblest  of  all  exercises,  it  being  "  a 
mixed  exercise,  partly  active  and  partly  passive,  while  other  sorts, 
such  as  walking,  running,  stooping,  or  the  like,  require  some  labour 
and  more  strength  for  their  performance."  Cheyne,  in  his  well- 
known  treatise  of  "  The  English  Malady,"  published  about  twenty 
years  after  Fuller's  work,  acknowledges  that  riding  on  horseback  is 
the  best  of  all  exercises,  for  which  he  details  his  reasons.  "  Walk- 
ing." he  says,  "though  it  will  answer  the  same  end,  yet  is  it  more 
laborious  and  tiresome;"  but  amusement  ought  always  to  be  com- 
bined with  the  exercise  of  a  student;  the  mind  will  receive  no 
refreshment  by  a  solitary  walk  or  ride,  unless  it  be  agreeably  with- 
drawn from  all  thouglufulness  and  anxiety;  if  it  continue  studying  in 
its  recreations,  it  is  the  sure  means  of  obtaining  neither  of  its  objects 
— a  friend,  not  an  author,  will  at  such  a  moment  be  the  better  com- 
panion. 

The  last  chapter  in  Fuller's  work  contains  much  curious  reading  on 
tl  ancient  physicians,  and  their  gymnastic  courses,  which  Ascle- 
piades,  the  pleasantest  of  all  the  ancient  physicians,  greatly  studied; 
he  was  most  fortunate  in  the  invention  of  exercises  to  supply  the 
place  of  much  physic,  and  (says  Fuller)  no  man  in  any  age  ever  had 


THE   MALADIES   OF   AUTHORS.  HI 

Among  the  correspondents  of  the  poets  Hughes  and 
Thomson,  there  is  a  pathetic  letter  from  a  student. 
Alexander  Bayne,  to  prepare  his  lectures,  studied  four- 
teen hours  a-day  for  eight  months  successively,  and 
wrote  1,600  sheets.  Such  intense  application,  which, 
however,  not  greatly  exceeds  that  of  many  authors, 
brought  on  the  bodily  complaints  he  has  minutely 
described,  with  "  all  the  dispiriting  symptoms  of  a 
nervous  illness,  commonly  called  vapours,  or  lowness  of 
spirits."  Bayne,  who  was  of  an  athletic  temperament, 
imagined  he  had  not  paid  attention  to  his  diet,  to  the 
lowness  of  his  desk,  and  his  habit  of  sitting  with  a  par- 
ticular compression  of  the  body;  in  future  all  these  were 
to  be  avoided.  He  prolonged  his  life  for  five  years,  and, 
perhaps,  was  still  flattering  his  hopes  of  shai'ing  one  day 
in  the  literary  celebrity  of  his  friends,  when,  to  use  his 
words,  "  the  same  illness  made  a  fierce  attack  upon 
me  again,  and  has  kept  me  in  a  very  bad  state  of  inac- 
tivity and  disrelish  of  all  my  ordinary  amusements :" 

the  happiness  to  obtain  so  general  an  applause;  Pliny  calls  him  the 
delight  of  mankind.  Admirable  physician,  who  had  so  many  ways,  it 
appears,  to  make  physic  agreeable  I  He  invented  the  lecli  pensiles,  or 
hanging  beds,  that  the  sick  might  be  rocked  to  sleep;  which  took  so 
much  at  that  time,  that  they  became  a  great  luxury  among  the 
Romans. 

Fuller  judiciously  does  not  recommend  the  gymnastic  courses,  be- 
cause horse-riding,  for  persons  of  delicate  constitutions,  is  preferable ; 
he  discovers  too  the  reasoD  why  the  ancients  did  not  introduce  this 
mode  of  exercise — it  arose  from  the  simple  circumstance  of  their  not 
knowing  the  use  of  stirrups,  which  was  a  later  invention.  Riding 
with  the  ancients  was,  therefore,  only  an  exercise  for  the  healthy  and 
the  robust ;  a  horse  without  stirrups  was  a  formidable  animal  for  a 
valetudinarian. 


112  CAUJ  3 

those  amusements  were  his  sei      is    ■'  There  is  a 

fascination  in  literary  labour:  the  student  feeds  on  magi- 
cal drugs  ;  to  withdraw  him  from  them  requires  nothing 
less  than  that  greater  magic  which  could  break  his  own 
spells,  A  few  months  after  this  letter  was  written 
Bayne  died  on  the  way  to  Bath,  a  martyr  to  his  studies. 

The  ssive  labour  on  a  voluminous  work,  which  oc- 

cupies a  long  life,  leaves  the  student  with  a  broken  con- 
stitution, and  his  sight  decayed  or  lost.  The  most  ad- 
mirable observer  of  mankind,  and  the  truest  painter  of  the 
human  heart,  declai  s,  •"The  corruptible  body  presseth 
down  the  soul,  and  the  earthy  tabernacle  weigheth  down 
the  mind  that  museth  on  many  things."1     Of  this  elass 

ls  old  Handle  Cotgrave,  the  curious  collector  of  the 
most  copious  dictionary  of  old  French  and  old  English 
words  and  phrases.  The  work  is  the  only  treasury  of 
our  genuine  idiom.  Even  this  labour  of  the  lexicon- 
rapher,  so  copious  and  so  elaborate,  must  have  been 
projected  with  rapture,  and  pursued  with  pleasure,  till, 
in  the  pi  _  ss,  "  the  mind  was  musing  on  many  thin  _- 
Then  came  the  melancholy  doubt,  that  drops  mildew 
from  its  enveloping  wings  over  the  voluminous  labour 
of  a  laborious  author,  whether  he  be  wisely  consuming 
his  days,  and  not  perpetually  neglecting  some  higher 
duties  r  amusements.     Still  the  enchanted 

delv  -  -  _ ■'  -.  and  strikes  on  in  the  glimmering  mine  of 
hope.  If  he  live  to  complete  the  great  labour,  it  is,  per- 
haps 1  for  the  applause  of  the  next  age;  for,  as 
our  great  lexicographer  exclaimed,  a  In  this  gloom  of 
solitude  I  have  protracted  my  work,  till  those  whom  I 


THE   MALADIES   OF   AUTHORS.  113 

A\i-'jed  to  please  have  sunk  into  the  grave,  and  success 
and  miscarriage  are  empty  sounds;"  but,  if  it  be  ap- 
plauded in  his  own,  that  praise  has  come  too  late  for 
him  whose  literary  labour  has  stolen  away  his  sight. 
Cot  grave  had  grown  blind  over  his  dictionary,  and  was 
doubtful  whether  this  work  of  his  laborious  days  and 
nightly  vigils  was  not  a  superfluous  labour,  and  nothing, 
after  all,  but  a  "poor  bundle  of  words."  The  reader 
may  listen  to  the  gray-headed  martyr  addressing  his 
patron,  Lord  Burghley : 

"  I  present  to  your  lordship  an  account  of  the  expense 
of  raamj  hours,  which,  in  your  service,  and  to  mine  own 
benefit,  might  have  been  otherwise  employed.  Aly  desires 
have  aimed  at  more  substantial  marks ;  but  mine  eyes 
failed  them,  and  forced  me  to  spend  out  their  vigour  in 
this  bundle  of  words,  which  maybe  unworthy  of  your 
lordship's  great  patience,  and,  perhaps,  ill-suited  to  the 
expectation  of  others" 

A  great  number  of  young  authors  have  died  of  over- 
study.  An  intellectual  enthusiasm,  accompanied  by  con- 
stitutional delicacy,  has  swept  away  half  the  rising  genius 
of  the  age.  Curious  calculators  have  affected  to  dis- 
cover the  average  number  of  infants  who  die  under  the 
age  of  five  years  :  had  they  investigated  those  of  the 
children  of  genius  who  perish  before  their  thirtieth  year, 
we  should  not  be  less  amazed  at  this  waste  of  man.  There 
are  few  scenes  more  afflicting,  nor  which  more  deeply  en- 
gage our  sympathy,  than  that  of  a  youth,  glowing  with  the 
devotion  of  study,  and  resolute  to  distinguish  his  name 
among  his  countrymen,  while  death  is  stealing  on  him, 


114:  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

touching  with  premature  age,  before  lie  strikes  the  last 
blow.     The  author  perishes  on  the  very  pages  whiohgive 

a  charm  to  his  existence.  The  fine  taste  and  tender  mel- 
ancholy of  Headley,  the  fervid  genius  of  Henry  Kirke 
"White,  will  not  easily  pass  away  ;  but  how  many  youths 
as  noble-minded  have  not  had  the  fortune  of  Kirke  White 
to  be  commemorated  by  genius,  and  have  perished  with- 
out their  fame  !  Henry  Wharton  is  a  name  well  known 
to  the  student  of  English  literature  ;  he  published  his- 
torical criticisms  of  high  value  ;  and  he  left,  as  some  of 
the  fruits  of  his  studies,  sixteen  volumes  of  MS.,  pre- 
served in  the  Archiepiscopal  Library  at  Lambeth.  These 
great  labours  were  pursued  with  the  ardour  that  only 
could  have  produced  them ;  the  author  had  not  exceeded 
his  thirtieth  year  when  he  sank  under  his  continued 
studies,  and  perished  a  martyr  to  literature.  Our  liter- 
ary, history  abounds  with  instances  of  the  sad  effects  of 
an  over  indulgence  in  study  :  that  agreeable  writer, 
Howel,  had  nearly  lost  his  life  by  an  excess  of  this  na- 
ture, studying  through  long  nights  in  the  depth  of  win- 
ter. This  severe  study  occasioned  an  imposthume  in  his 
head ;  he  was  eighteen  days  without  sleep  ;  and  the  ill- 
ness was  attended  with  many  other  afflicting  symptoms. 
The  eager  diligence  of  Blackmore,  protracting  his  studies 
through  the  night,  broke  his  health,  and  obliged  him  to 
fly  to  a  country  retreat.  Harris,  the  historian,  died  of  a 
consumption  by  midnight  studies,  as  his  friend  Ilollis 
mentions.  I  shall  add  a  recent  instance,  which  I  myself 
witnessed  :  it  is  that  of  John  Macdiarmid.  He  was  one 
of  those  Scotch  students  whom  the  ffolden  fame  of  Hume 


THE    MALADIES   OF   AUTHORS.  115 

and  Robertson  attracted  to  the  metropolis.  He  mounted 
the  first  steps  of  literary  adventure  with  credit;  and 
passed  through  the  probation  of  editor  and  reviewer,  till 
he  strove  for  more  heroic  adventures.  He  published 
some  volumes,  whose  subjects  display  the  aspirings  of 
his  genius:  "An  Inquiry  into  the  Nature  of  Civil  and 
Military  Subordination  ;"  another  into  "  The  System  of 
Military  Defence."  It  was  during  these  labours  I  beheld 
this  inquirer,  of  a  tender  frame,  emaciated,  and  study- 
worn,  with  hollow  eyes,  where  the  mind  dimly  shone  like 
a  lamp  in  a  tomb.  With  keen  ardour  he  opened  a  ucav 
plan  of  biographical  politics.  When,  by  one  who  wished 
the  author  was  in  better  condition,  the  dangers  of  excess 
in  study  were  brought  to  his  recollection,  he  smiled,  and, 
witli  something  of  a  mysterious  air,  talked  of  unalterable 
confidence  in  the  powers  of  his  mind  ;  of  the  indefinite 
improvement  in  our  faculties;  and,  with  this  enfeebled 
frame,  considered  himself  capable  of  continuous  labour. 
His  whole  life,  indeed,  was  one  melancholy  trial.  Often 
the  day  cheerfully  passed  without  its  meal,  but  never 
without  its  page.  The  new  system  of  political  biography 
was  advancing,  when  our  young  author  felt  a  paralytic 
stroke.  He  afterwards  resumed  his  pen  ;  and  a  second 
one  proved  fatal.  He  lived  just  to  pass  through  the 
press  his  "  Lives  of  British  Statesmen,"  a  splendid  quarto, 
whose  publication  he  owed  to  the  generous  temper  of  a 
friend,  who,  when  the  author  could  not  readily  procure  a 
publisher,  would  not  see  the  dying  author's  last  hope  dis- 
appointed. Some  research  and  reflection  are  combined 
in   this    literary  and  civil  history  of  the  sixteenth   and 


116  CALAMITIES  OF   AUTHORS. 

seventeenth  centuries ;  but  it  was  written  with  the  blood 
of  the  author,  for  Macdiarmid  died  of  over-study  and  ex- 
haustion. 

Among  the  maladies  of  poor  authors,  who  procure  a 
precarious  existence  by  their  pen,  one,  not  the  least  con- 
siderable, is  their  old  age  ;  their  flower  and  maturity  of 
life  were  shed  for  no  human  comforts  ;  and  old  age  is  the 
withered  root.  The  late  Thomas  Mortimer,  the  compiler, 
among  other  things,  of  that  useful  work,  "  The  Student's 
Pocket  Dictionary,"  felt  this  severely — ho  himself  ex- 
perienced no  abatement  of  his  ardour,  nor  deficiency  in 
his  intellectual  powers,  at  near  the  age  of  eighty  ; — but 
he  then  would  complain  "  of  the  paucity  of  literary  em- 
ployment, and  the  preference  given  to  young  adven- 
turers." Such  is  the  youth,  and  such  the  old  aye  of 
ordinary  authors  ! 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN. 

"TTTIIAT  literary  emigrations  from  the  North  of  young 
'  '  men  of  genius,  seduced  by  a  romantic  passion  for 
literary  fame,  and  lured  by  the  golden  prospects  which 
the  happier  genius  of  some  of  their  own  countrymen 
opened  on  them.  A  volume  might  be  written  on  literary 
Scotchmen,  who  have  perished  immaturely  in  this  me- 
tropolis ;  little  known,  and  slightly  connected,  they  have 
dropped  away  among  us,  and  scarcely  left  a  vestige  in 
the  wrecks  of  their  genius.  Among  them  some  authors 
may  be  discovered  who  might  have  ranked,  perhaps,  in 


LITERARY   SCOTCIIMEX.  117 

the  first  classes  of  our  literature.  I  shall  select  four  out 
of  as  many  hundred,  who  were  not  entirely  unknown  to 
me  ;  a  romantic  youth — a  man  of  genius — a  brilliant 
prose  writer — and  a  labourer  in  literature. 

Isaac  Ritson  (not  the  poetical  antiquary)  was  a  young 
man  of  genius,  who  perished  immaturely  in  this  metropo- 
lis by  attempting  to  exist  by  the  efforts  of  his  pen. 

In  early  youth  he  roved  among  his  native  mountains, 
with  the  battles  of  Homer  in  his  head,  and  his  bow  and 
arrow  in  his  hand  ;  in  calmer  hours,  he  nearly  completed 
a  spirited  version  of  Hesiod,  which  constantly  occupied 
his  after-studies  ;  yet  our  minstrel-archer  did  not  less  love 
the  severer  sciences. 

Selected  at  length  to  rise  to  the  eminent  station  of  the 
Village  Schoolmaster, — from  the  thankless  office  of  pour- 
ing cold  rudiments  into  heedless  ears,  Ritson  took  a  po- 
etical flight.  It  was  among  the  mountains  and  wild 
scenery  of  Scotland  that  our  young  Homer,  picking  up 
fragments  of  heroic  songs,  and  composing  some  fine  bal- 
lad poetry,  would,  in  his  Avanderings,  recite  them  with 
such  passionate  expression,  that  he  never  failed  of  audi- 
tors ;  and  found  even  the  poor  generous,  when  their  bet- 
ter passions  were  moved.  Thus  he  lived,  like  some  old 
troubadour,  by  his  rhymes,  and  his  chants,  and  his  vire- 
lays ;  and,  after  a  year's  absence,  our  bard  returned  in 
the  triumph  of  verse.  This  was  the  most  seducing  mo- 
ment of  life  ;  Ritson  felt  himself  a  laureated  Petrarch  ; 
but  he  had  now  quitted  his  untutored  but  feeling  ad- 
mirers, and  the  child  of  fancy  was  to  mix  with  the  every- 
day business  of  life. 


US  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

At  Edinburgh  he  studied  medicine,  lived  by  writing 
theses  for  the  idle  and  the  incompetent,  and  composed  a 
poem  on  Medicine,  till  at  length  his  hopes  and  his  am- 
bition conducted  him  to  London. s  But  the  golden  age  of 
the  imagination  soon  deserted  him  in  his  obscure  apart- 
ment in  the  glittering  metropolis.  He  attended  the  hos- 
pitals, but  these  were  crowded  by  students  who,  if  they 
relished  the  science  less,  loved  the  trade  more  :  he  pub- 
lished a  hasty  version  of  Homer's  Hymn  to  Venus,  which 
was  good  enough  to  be  praised,  but  not  to  sell ;  at  length 
his  fertile  imagination,  withering  over  the  taskwork  of 
literature,  he  resigned  fame  for  bread  ;  wrote  the  preface 
to  Clarke's  Survey  of  the  Lakes,  compiled  medical  arti- 
cles for  the  Monthly  Review;  and,  wasting  fast  his 
ebbing  spirits,  he  retreated  to  an  obscure  lodging  at 
Islington,  where  death  relieved  a  hopeless  author,  in  the 
twenty-seventh  year  of  his  life. 

The  following  unpolished  lines  were  struck  off  at  a 
heat  in  trying  his  pen  on  the  back  of  a  letter  ;  he  wrote 
the  names  of  the  Sister  Fates,  Clotho,  Lachesis,  and 
Atropos — the  sudden  recollection  of  his  own  fate  rushed 
on  him — and  thus  the  rhapsodist  broke  out : — 

I  wonder  much,  as  yet  ye*re  spinning,  Fates  I 
"What  threads  yet  twisted  out  for  me,  old  jades  I 
Ah.  Atropos  !  perhaps  for  me  thou  spinn'st 
Xecrlect,  contempt,  and  penury  and  woe; 
Be't  so;  whilst  that  foul  fiend,  the  spleen, 
And  moping  melancholy  spare  me,  all  the  rest 
I'll  bear,  as  should  a  man  ;  'twill  do  me  good, 
And  teach  me  what  no  better  fortune  could, 
Humility,  and  sympathy  with  others'  ills. 
Ye  destinies, 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN.  119 

I  love  you  much ;  ye  flatter  not  my  pride. 

Your  mien,  'tis  true,  is  wrinkled,  hard,  and  sour; 

Your  words  are  harsh  and  stern  :  and  sterner  still 

Your  purposes  to  me.     Yet  I  forgive 

Whatever  you  have  done,  or  mean  to  do. 

Beneath  some  baleful  planet  horn,  I've  found, 

In  all  this  world,  no  friend  with  fostering  hand 

To  lead  me  on  to  science,  which  I  love 

Beyond  all  else  the  world  could  give  ;  yet  still 

Your  rigour  I  forgive;  ye  are  not  y<3t  my  foes; 

My  own  uututor'd  will's  my  only  curse. 

Wo  grasp  asphaltic  apples;  blooming  poison  ! 

We  love  what  we  should  hate  ;  how  kind,  ye  Fates, 

To  thwart  our  wishes  !     0  you're  kind  to  scourge  I 

And  flay  us  to  the  bone  to  make  us  feell — 

Thus  deeply  lie  enters  into  his  own  feelings,  and  ab- 
jures his  errors,  as  he  paints  the  utter  desolation  of  the 
soul  while  falling  into  the  grave  opening  at  his  feet. 

The  town  was  once  amused  almost  every  morning  by 
a  series  of  humorous  or  burlesque  poems  by  a  writer 
under  the  assumed  name  of  Mattliew  Bramble — he  was 
at  that  very  moment  one  of  the  most  moving  spectacles 
of  human  melancholy  I  have  ever  witnessed. 

It  was  one  evening  I  saw  a  tall,  famished,  melancholy 
man  enter  a  bookseller's  shop,  his  hat  flapped  over  his 
eyes,  and  his  whole  frame  evidently  feeble  from  exhaus- 
tion and  utter  misery.  The  bookseller  inquired  how  he 
proceeded  in  his  new  tragedy.  "  Do  not  talk  to  me 
about  my  tragedy  ?  Do  not  talk  to  me  about  my  trag- 
edy I  have  indeed  more  tragedy  than  I  can  bear  at 
home !"  was  the  reply,  and  the  voice  faltered  as  he 
spoke.  This  man  was  Matthew  Bramble,  or  rather — 
M'Donald,  the  author  of  the  tragedy  of    Vimonda,  at 


12Q  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

that  moment  the  writer  of  comic  poetry — his  tragedy 
was  indeed  a  domestic  one,  in  which  he  himself  was  the 
greatest  actor  amid  his  disconsolate  family  ;  he  shortly 
afterwards  perished.  Al'Donald  had  walked  from  Scot- 
land witli  no  other  fortune  than  the  novel  of  "The  Inde- 
pendent'" in  one  pocket,  and  the  tragedy  of  "  Vimonda" 
in  the  other.  Yet  he  lived  some  time  in  all  the  bloom 
and  flush  of  poetical  confidence.  Yimonda  was  evea. 
performed  several  nights,  but  not  with  the  success  the 
romantic  poet,  among  his  native  rocks,  had  conceived  was 
to  crown  his  anxious  labours — the  theatre  disappointed 
him — and  afterwards,  to  his  feelings,  all  the  world  ! 

Logan  had  the  dispositions  of  a  poetic  spirit,  not  cast 
in  a  common  mould;  with  fancy  he  combined  learning, 
and  with  eloquence  philosophy. 

His  claims  on  our  sympathy  arise  from  those  circum- 
stances in  his  life  which  open  the  secret  sources  of  the 
calamities  of  authors;  of  those  minds  of  finer  temper, 
who,  having  tamed  the  heat  of  their  youth  by  the 
patient  severity  of  study,  from  causes  not  always  difficult 
to  discover,  find  their  favourite  objects  and  their  fondest 
hopes  barren  and  neglected.  It  is  then  that  the  thought- 
ful melancholy,  which  constitutes  so  large  a  portion  of 
their  genius,  absorbs  and  consumes  the  very  faculties  to 
which  it  gave  birth. 

Logan   studied  al    the    University  of  Edinburgh,  was 
ordained  in  the  Church  of  Scotland — and  early  distin- 
guished as  a  poet  by  the  simplicity  and  the  tender; 
of  his  verses,  yet  the  philosophy  of  history  had  as  deeply 
interested   his    studies.      lie    save  two  courses    of    lee- 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN.  121 

tures.  I  have  heard  from  his  pupils  their  admiration, 
after  the  lapse  of  many  years  ;  so  striking  were  those 
lectures  for  having  successfully  applied  the  science  of 
moral  philosophy  to  the  history  of  nations.  All  wished 
that  Logan  should  obtain  the  chair  of  the  Professorship  of 
Universal  History — but  from  some  point  of  etiquette  he 
failed  in  obtaining  that  distinguished  office. 

This  was  his  first  disappointment  in  life,  yet  then  per- 
haps but  lightly  felt;  for  the  public  had  approved  of 
his  poems,  and  a  successful  poet  is  easily  consoled. 
Poetry  to  such  a  gentle  being  seems  a  universal  specific 
for  all  the  evils  of  life  ;  it  acts  at  the  moment,  exhaust- 
ing and  destroying  too  often  the  constitution  it  seems  to 
restore. 

He  had  finished  the  tragedy  of  "  Runnymede ;"  it  was 
accepted  at  Covent-garden,  but  interdicted  by  the  Lord 
Chamberlain,  from  some  suspicion  that  its  lofty  senti- 
ments contained  allusions  to  the  politics  of  the  day. 
The  Barons-in-arms  who  met  John  were  conceived  to  be 
deeper  politicians  than  the  poet  himself  was  aware  of. 
This  was  the  second  disappointment  in  the  life  of  this 
man  of  genius. 

The  third  calamity  was  the  natural  consequence  of  a 
tragic  poet  being  also  a  Scotch  clergyman.  Logan  had 
inflicted  a  wound  on  the  Presbytery,  heirs  of  the  genius 
of  old  Prynne,  whose  puritanic  fanaticism  had  never  for- 
given Home  for  his  "  Douglas,"  and  now  groaned  to 
detect  genius   still   lurking   among  them.*     Logan,  it  is 

*  Home  was  at  the  time  when  he  wrote  "  Douglas"  a  clergyman  in 
the  Scottish  Church;  the  theatre  was  then  looked  upon  by  the  religious 


122  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

certain,  expressed  his  coutempt  for  them;  they  their 
hatred  of  him:  folly  and  pride  in  a  poet, to  heard  Pres- 
byters in  a  land  of  Presbyterians  ! :;: 

He  gladly  abandoned  them,  retiring  on  a  small 
annuity.  They  had,  however,  hurt  his  temper — they 
had  irritated  the  nervous  system  of  a  man  too  suscep- 
tible  of  all  impressions,  gentle  or  unkind — his  character 
had  all  those  unequal  habitudes  which  genius  contracts 
in  its  boldness  and  its  tremors  ;  he  was  now  vivacious 
and  indignant,  and  now  fretted  stnd  melancholy.  lie 
flew  to  the  metropolis,  occupied  himself  in  literature, 
and  was  a  frequent  contributor  to  the  "English  lie- 
view."  He  published  >%  A  Review  of  the  Principal 
Charges  against  Mr.  Hastings."  Logan  wrestled  with 
the  genius  of  Burke  and  Sheridan;  the  House  of  Com- 
mons ordered  the  publisher  Stockdale  to  be  prosecuted, 
but  the  author  did  not  live  to  rejoice  in  the  victory 
obtained  by  his  genius. 

This  elegant  philosopher  has  impressed  on  all  his 
works  the  seal  of  genius;  and  his  posthumous  com- 
positions became  even  popular;  he  who  had  with  diffi- 
culty escaped  excommunication  by  Presbyters,  left  the 

-       -men  with  the  most  perfect  abhorrence.     Many  means  were  taken 
to  deter  the  performance  of  the  play;  and  as   they  did   not  sue 
others  were  tried  to  annoy  the  author,  until  their  persevering  efl 
induced  him  to  withdraw   himself  entirely  from  the  clerical  pnj.es- 
Bion. —  Hi). 

*  The  objection  to  his  tragedy  was  made  chiefly  by  his  parisl 
at  South  Leith.  who  were  .posed  to  their  minister  being  in 

anv  way  connected  with  the  theatre.  He  therefore  resigned  his  n|>- 
p.'intment,  and  settled  in  London,  which  he  never  afterwards  aban- 
doned, dying  there  in  ITsS. — lib. 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN-  123 

•world  after  his  death  two  volumes  of  sermons,  which 
breathe  all  that  piety,  morality,  and  eloquence  admire. 
His  unrevised  lectures,  published  under  the  name  of 
a  person,  one  Rutherford,  who  had  purchased  the  MS., 
■were  given  to  the  world  in  "  A  View  of  Ancient  His- 
tory." But  one  highly-finished  composition  he  had 
himself  published;  it  is  a  philosophical  review  of 
Despotism:  had  the  name  of  Gibbon  been  affixed  to 
the  title-page,  its  authenticity  had  not  been  suspected.* 

From  one  of  his  executors,  Mr.  Donald  Grant,  who 
wrote  the  life  prefixed  to  his  poems,  I  heard  of  the  state 
of  his  numerous  MSS. ;  the  scattered,  yet  warm  embers 
of  the  unhappy  bard.  Several  tragedies,  and  one  on 
Mary  Queen  of  Scots,  abounding  with  all  that  domestic 
tenderness  and  poetic  sensibility  which  formed  the  soft 
and  natural  feature  of  his  muse ;  these,  with  minor 
poems,  thirty  lectures  on  the  Roman  History,  and  por- 
tions of  a  periodical  paper,  were  the  wrecks  of  genius  ! 
He  resided  here,  little  known  out  of  a  very  private 
circle,  and  perished  in  his  fortieth  year,  not  of  penury, 
but  of  a  broken  heart.  Such  noble  and  well-founded 
expectations  of  fortune  and  fame,  all  the  plans  of  literary 
ambition  overturned :  his  genius,  with  all  its  delicacy, 
its  spirit,  and  its  elegance,  became  a  prey  to  th-at 
melancholy  which  constituted  so  large  a  portion  of  it. 


*  This  admirable  little  work  is  entitled  "A  Dissertation  on  the 
Governments,  Manners,  and  Spirit  of  Asia  ;  Murray,  1787."  It  is 
anonymous  ;  but  the  publisher  informed  me  it  was  written  by  Logan. 
His  "Elements  of  the  Philosophy  of  History"  are  valuable.  His 
"Sermons  "  have  been  republished. 


124  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

Logan,  in  his  "  Ode  to  a  Man  of  Letters,"  had  formed 
this  lofty  conception  of  a  great  author: — 

"Won  from  neglected  wastes  of  time, 
Apollo  hails  his  fairest  clime, 

The  provinces  of  mind ; 
An  Egypt  with  eternal  towers;* 
See  Montesquieu  redeem  the  hours 

From  Louis  to  mankind. 

No  tame  remission  genius  knows, 
No  interval  of  dark  repose. 

To  quench  the  ethereal  flame ; 
From  Thebes  to  Troy,  the  victor  hies, 
And  Homer  with  his  hero  vies, 

In  varied  paths  to  Fame. 

Our  children  will  long  repeat  his  "  Ode  to  the 
Cuckoo,"  one  of  the  most  lovely  poems  in  onr  language; 
magical  stanzas  of  picture,  melody,  and  sentiment. "f 

These  authors  were  undoubtedly  men  of  finer  feelings, 
■who  all  perished  immaturely,  victims  in  the  higher 
department  of  literature !  But  this  article  would  not 
be  complete  without  furnishing  the  reader  with  a  picture 
of  the  fate  of  one  who,  with  a  pertinacity  of  industry 
not  common,  having  undergone  regular  studies,  not 
very  injudiciously  deemed  that  the  life  of  a  man  of 
letters  could  provide  for  the  simple  wants  of  a  philoso- 
pher. 

*  The  finest  provinces  of  Egypt  gained  from  a  neglected  waste. 

+  An  attempt  has  been  made  to  deprive  Logan  of  the  authorship 
of  this  poem.  He  had  edited  (very  badly)  the  poems  of  a  deceased 
friend.  Michael  Bruce;  and  the  friends  of  the  latter  claimed  this  poem 
ie  of  them.  In  the  words  of  one  who  has  examined  the  evidence 
it  may  be  sufficient  to  claim  is  not  only  supported  by  internal 

evidence,  but  the  charge  was  never  advanced  against  him  while  he 
was  alive  to  repel  it.'' — Ed. 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN".  125 

This  man  was  the  late  Robert  Heron,  who,  in  the 
following  letter,  transcribed  from  the  original,  stated 
his  history  to  the  Literary  Fund.  It  was  written  in  a 
moment  of  extreme  bodily  suffering  and  mental  agony 
in  the  house  to  which  he  had  been  hurried  for  debt. 
At  such  a  moment  he  found  eloquence  in  a  narrative, 
pathetic  from  its  simplicity,  and  valuable  for  its  genuine- 
ness, as  giving  the  results  of  a  life  of  literary  industry, 
productive  of  great  infelicity  and  disgrace;  one  would 
imagine  that  the  author  had  been  a  criminal  rather  than 
a  man  of  letters. 

"  The   Case  of  a  Man  of  Letters,  of  regular  education, 
living  by  honest  literary  industry. 

"  Ever  since  I  was  eleven  years  of  age  I  have  mingled 
with  my  studies  the  labour  of  teaching  or  of  writing,  to 
support  and  educate  myself. 

"  During  about  twenty  years,  while  I  was  in  constant 
or  occasional  attendance  at  the  University  of  Edin- 
burgh, I  taught  and  assisted  young  persons,  at  all 
periods,  in  the  course  of  education  ;  from  the  Alphabet 
to  the  highest  branches  of  Science  and  Literature. 

"I  read  a  course  of  Lectures  on  the  Law  of  Nature, 
the  Law  of  Nations ;  the  Jewish,  the  Grecian,  the 
Roman,  and  the  Canon  Law;  and  then  on  the  Feudal 
Law ;  and  on  the  several  forms  of  Municipal  Jurispru- 
dence established  in  Modern  Europe.  I  printed  a 
Syllabus  of  these  Lectures,  which  was  approved.  They 
were  intended  as  introductory  to  the  professional  study 


126  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

of  Law,  and  to  assist  gentlemen  who   did  not  study  it 
professionally,  in  the  understanding  of  History. 

"I  translated  'Fourcroy's  Chemistry'  twice,  from 
both  the  second  and  the  third  editions  of  the  original ; 
'Fourcroy's  Philosophy  of  Chemistry;'  'Salary's 
Travels  in  Greece;'  'Dumourier's  Letters;'  '  Gessner's 
Idylls'  in  part;  an  abstract  of  'Zimmerman  on  Soli- 
tude,' and  a  great  diversity  of  smaller  pieces. 

"  I  wrote  a  '  Journey  through  the  Western  Parts  of 
Scotland,'  which  has  passed  through  two  editions;  a 
'  History  of  Scotland,'  in  six  volumes  8vo  ;  a  '  Topo- 
graphical Account  of  Scotland,'  which  has  been  several 
times  reprinted;  a  number  of  communications  in  the 
'  Edinburgh  Magazine ;'  many  Prefaces  and  Critiques ;  a 
'Memoir  of  the  Life  of  Burns  the  Poet,'  which  sug- 
gested and  promoted  the  subscription  for  his  family — 
has  been  many  times  reprinted,  and  formed  the  basis 
of  Dr.  Currie's  Life  of  him,  as  I  learned  by  a  letter  from 
the  doctor  to  one  of  his  friends;  a  variety  of  Jevxc 
<T Esprit  in  verse  and  prose  ;  and  many  abridgments  of 
large  works. 

"In  the  beginning  of  1799  I  was  encouraged  to  come 
to  London.  Here  I  have  written  a  great  multiplicity 
of  articles  in  almost  every  branch  of  science  and  litera- 
ture; my  education  at  Edinburgh  having  comprehended 
them  all.  The  'London  Review,'  the  'Agricultural 
Magazine,'  the  'Anti-Jacobin  Review,'  the  'Monthly 
Magazine,' the 'Universal  Magazine,' the  'Public  Char- 
acters,' the  'Annual  Necrology,'  with  several  other 
periodical    works,  contain    many   of  my  communications 


LITERARY   SCOTCHMEN.  127 

In  sucli  of  those  publications  as  have  been  reviewed, 
I  can  show  that  my  anonymous  pieces  have  been  dis- 
tinguished with  very  high  praise.  I  have  written 
also  a  short  system  of  Chemistry,  in  one  volume  8vo ; 
and  I  published  a  few  weeks  since  a  small  work  called 
'Comforts  of  Life,'*  of  which  the  first  edition  was  sold 
in  one  week,  and  the  second  edition  is  now  in  rapid  sale. 

"  In  the  Newspapers — the  Oracle,  the  Porcupine  when 
it  existed,  the  General  Evening  Post,  the  Morning  Post, 
the  British  Press,  the  Courier,  &c,  I  have  published 
many  Reports  of  Debates  in  Parliament,  and,  I  believe, 
a  greater  variety  of  light  fugitive  pieces  than  I  know  to 
have  been  written  by  any  one  other  person. 

"  I  have  written  also  a  variety  of  compositions  in  the 
Latin  and  the  French  languages,  in  favour  of  which  I 
have  been  honoured  with  the  testimonies  of  liberal 
approbation. 

"  I  have  invariably  written  to  serve  the  cause  of 
religion,  morality,  pious  christian  education,  and  good 
order,  in  the  most  direct  manner.  I  have  considered 
what  I  have  written  as  mere  trifies ;  and  have  inces- 
santly studied  to  qualify  myself  for  something  better. 
I  can  prove  that  I  have,  for  many  years,  read  and 
written,  one  day  with  another,  from  twelve  to  sixteen 
hours  a  day.  As  a  human  being,  I  have  not  been  free 
from  follies  and  errors.     But  the  tenor  of  my  life  has 


*  "  The  Comforts  of  Life  "  were  written  in  prison ;  "  The  Miseries  " 
(by  Jas  Beresford)  necessarily  in  a  drawing-room.  The  works  of 
authors  are  often  in  contrast  with  themselves  ;  melancholy  authors  are 
the  most  jocular,  and  the  most  humorous  the  most  melancholy 


128  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

been  temperate,  laborious,  humble,  quiet,  and,  to  the 
vtmost  of  my  power,  beneficent.  I  can  prove  the 
general  tenor  of  my  writings  to  have  been  candid,  and 
ever  adapted  to  exhibit  the  most  favourable  views  of 
the  abilities,  dispositions,  and  exertions  of  others. 

"For  these  last  ten  months  I  have  been  brought  to 
the  very  extremity  of  bodily  and  pecuniary  distress. 

"I  shudder  at  the  thought  of  perishing  in  a  craol. 

"92,    Chancery-lane,  Feb.  2,   1S07. 

"  (In  confinement)." 

The  physicians  reported  that  Robert  Heron's  health 
was  such  "  as  rendered  him  totally  incapable  of  extri- 
cating himself  from  the  difficulties  in  which  he  was 
involved,  by  the  indiscreet  exertion  of  his  mind,  in 
protracted  and  incessant  literary  labours.'''' 

About  three  months  after,  Heron  sunk  under  a  fever, 
and  perished  amid  the  walls  of  Newgate.  We  are  dis- 
gusted with  this  horrid  state  of  pauperism ;  we  are 
indignant  at  beholding  an  author,  not  a  contemptible 
one,  in  this  last  stage  of  human  wretchedness !  after 
early  and  late  studies — after  having  read  and  written 
from  twelve  to  sixteen  hours  a  day  !  O,  ye  populace 
of  scribblers !  before  ye  are  driven  to  a  garret,  and  your 
eyes  are  filled  with  constant  tears,  pause — recollect  that 
few  of  you  possess  the  learning  or  the  abilities  of  Heron. 

The  fate  of  Heron  is  the  fate  of  hundreds  of  authors 
by  profession  in  the  present  day — of  men  of  some  literary 
talent,  who  can  never  extricate  themselves  from  a  de- 
grading state  of  poverty. 


LABORIOUS    AUTHORS.  129 


LABORIOUS  AUTHORS. 

T  I  iIIIS  is  one  of  the  groans  of  old  Burton  over  his 
-*~  laborious  work,  when  he  is  anticipating  the  recep- 
tion it  is  like  to  meet  with,  and  personates  his  objectors. 
He  says  : — 

"  This  is  a  thinge  of  meere  industrie — a  collection 
without  wit  or  invention — a  very  toy  !  So  men  are 
valued  ! — their  labours  vilified  by  fellowes  of  no  worth 
themselves,  as  things  of  nought ;  who  could  not  have 
done  as  much." 

There  is,  indeed,  a  class  of  authors  who  are  liable  to 
forfeit  all  claims  to  genius,  whatever  their  genius  may 
be — these  are  the  laborious  writers  of  voluminous  works ; 
but  they  are  farther  subject  to  heavier  grievances — to 
be  undervalued  or  neglected  by  the  apathy  or  the  in- 
gratitude of  the  public. 

Industry  is  often  conceived  to  betray  the  absence  of 
intellectual  exertion,  and  the  magnitude  of  a  work  is 
imagined  necessarily  to  shut  out  all  genius.  Yet  a 
laborious  work  has  often  had  an  original  growth  and 
raciness  in  it,  requiring  a  genius  whose  peculiar  feeling, 
like  invisible  vitality,  is  spread  through  the  mighty 
body.  Feeble  imitations  of  such  laborious  works  have 
proved  the  master's  mind  that  is  in  the  original.  There 
is  a  talent  in  industry  which  every  industrious  man 
does  not  possess ;  and  even  taste  and  imagination  may 
lead  to  the  deepest  studies  of  antiquities,  as  well  as  mere 
undiscerning  curiosity  and  plodding  dulness. 


130  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

But  there  are  other  more  striking  characteristics  of 
intellectual  feeling  in  authors  of  this  class.  The  forti- 
tude of  mind  which  enables  them  to  complete  labours 
of  which,  in  many  instances,  they  are  conscious  that  the 
real  value  will  only  be  appreciated  by  dispassionate 
posterity,  themselves  rarely  living  to  witness  the  fame 
of  their  own  work  established,  while  they  endure  the 
captiousness  of  malicious  cavillers.  It  is  said  that  the 
Optics  of  Newton  had  no  character  or  credit  here  till 
noticed  in  France.  It  would  not  be  the  only  instance 
of  an  author  writing  above  his  own  age,  and  anticipating 
its  more  advanced  genius.  How  many  works  of  erudi- 
tion might  be  adduced  to  show  their  author's  disappoint- 
ments !  Prideaux's  learned  work  of  the  "  Connexion  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testament,"  and  Shuckford's  similar 
one,  were  both  a  long  while  before  they  could  obtain  a 
publisher,  and  much  longer  before  they  found  readers. 
It  is  said  Sir  Walter  Raleigh  burned  the  second  volume 
of  his  History,  from  the  ill  success  the  first  had  met 
with.  Prince's  ""Worthies  of  Devon"  was  so  unfavour- 
ably received  by  the  public,  that  the  laborious  and  pa- 
triotic author  was  so  discouraged  as  not  to  print  the 
second  volume,  which  is  said  to  have  been  prepared  for 
the  press.  Farneworth's  elaborate  Translation,  with  notes 
and  dissertations,  of  Machiavel's  works,  was  hawked 
about  the  town  ;  and  the  poor  author  discovered  that 
he  understood  Machiavel  better  than  the  public  After 
Other  labours  of  this  kind,  he  left  hi^  family  in  distressed 
circumstances.  Observe,  this  excellent  book  now  bears 
a  high  price  !     The  fate  of  the  "  Biographia  Britannica," 


LABORIOUS  AUTHORS.  131 

in  its  first  edition,  must  be  noticed:  the  spirit  and  acute- 
ness  of  Campbell,  the  curious  industry  of  Oldys,  and  the 
united  labours  of  very  able  writers,  could  not  secure 
public  favour ;  this  treasure  of  our  literary  history  was 
on  the  point  of  being  suspended,  when  a  poem  by  Gil- 
bert "West  drew  the  public  attention  to  that  elaborate 
work,  which,  however,  still  languished,  and  was  hastily 
concluded.  Granger  says  of  his  admirable  work,  in  one 
of  his  letters : — "  On  a  fair  state  of  my  account,  it  would 
appear  that  my  labours  in  the  improvement  of  my  work 
do  not  amount  to  half  the,  pay  of  a  scavenger!'1''  He 
received  only  one  hundred  pounds  to  the  times  of 
Charles  I.,  and  the  rest  to  depend  on  public  favour  for 
the  continuation.  The  sale  was  sluggish ;  even  "Walpole 
seemed  doubtful  of  its  success,  though  he  probably  se- 
cretly envied  the  skill  of  our  portrait-painter.  It  was 
too  philosophical  for  the  mere  collector,  and  it  took  near 
ten  years  before  it  reached  the  hands  of  philosophers ; 
the  author  derived  little  profit,  and  never  lived  to  see 
its  popularity  established !  "We  have  had  many  highly 
valuable  works  suspended  for  their  want  of  public 
patronage,  to  the  utter  disappointment,  and  sometimes 
the  ruin  of  their  authors,  such  are  Oldys's  "British  Li- 
brarian," Morgan's  "  Phcenix  Britannicus,"  Dr.  Berken- 
hout's  "Biographia  Literaria,"  Professor  Martyn's  and 
Dr.  Lettice's  "  Antiquities  of  Ilerculaneum :"  all  these 
are  first  volumes,  there  are  no  seconds!  They  are  now 
rare,  curious,  and  high  priced  !  Ungrateful  public  ! 
Unhappy  authors ! 

That  noble  enthusiasm  which  so  strontrlv  characterises 


132  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

genius,  in  productions  whose  originality  is  of  a  less  am- 
biguous nature,  lias  been  experienced  by  some  of  these 
laborious  authors,  who  have  sacrificed  their  lives  and 
fortunes  to  their  beloved  studies.  The  enthusiasm  of 
literature  lias  often  been  that  of  heroism,  and  many  have 
not  shrunk  from  the  forlorn  hope. 

Rushworth  and  Rymer,  to  whose  collections  our  his- 
tory stands  so  deeply  indebted,  must  have  strongly  felt 
this  literary  ardour,  for  they  passed  their  lives  in  form- 
ing them;  till  Rymer,  in  the  utmost  distress,  was  obliged 
to  sell  his  books  and  his  fifty  volumes  of  MS.  which  he 
could  not  get  printed  ;  and  Rushworth  died  in  the  King's 
Bench  of  a  broken  heart.  Many  of  his  papers  still  re- 
main unpublished.  His  ruling  passion  was  amassing 
state  matters,  and  he  voluntarily  neglected  great  oppor- 
tunities of  acquiring  a  large  fortune  for  this  entire  devo- 
tion of  his  life.  The  same  fate  has  awaited  the  similar 
labours  of  many  authors  to  whom  the  history  of  our 
country  lies  under  deep  obligations.  Arthur  Collins, 
the  historiographer  of  our  Peerage,  and  the  curious  col- 
lector of  the  valuable  "Sydney  Papers,"'  and  other 
collections,  passed  his  life  in  rescuing  these  works  of 
antiquity,  in  giving  authenticity  to  our  history,  or  con- 
tributing fresh  materials  to  it;  but  his  midnight  vigils 
were  cheered  by  no  patronage,  nor  his  labours  valued, 
till  the  eye  that  pored  on  the  mutilated  31S.  was  for 
ever  closed.  Of  all  those  curious  works  of  the  late  Mr. 
Strutt,  which  are  now  bearing  such  high  prices,  all  were 
produced  by  extensive  reading,  and  illustrated  by  his 
own  drawings,  from  the  manuscripts  of  different  epochs 


LABORIOUS  AUTHORS.  13;> 

in  our  history.  What  was  the  result  to  that  ingenious 
artist  and  author,  who,  under  the  plain  simplicity  of  an 
antiquary,  concealed  a  fine  poetical  mind,  and  an  enthu- 
siasm for  his  beloved  pursuits  to  which  only  we  are 
indebted  for  them?  Strutt,  living  in  the  greatest  ob- 
scurity, and  voluntarily  sacrificing  all  the  ordinary  views 
of  life,  and  the  trade  of  his  burin,  solely  attached  to 
national  antiquities,  and  charmed  by  calling  them  into  a 
fresh  existence  under  his  pencil,  I  have  witnessed  at  the 
British  Museum,  forgetting  for  whole  days  his  miseries, 
in  sedulous  research  and  delightful  labour;  at  times 
even  doubtful  whether  he  could  get  his  works  printed ; 
for  some  of  which  he  was  not  regaled  even  with  the 
Roman  supper  of  "  a  radish  and  an  egg."  How  he  left 
his  domestic  affairs,  his  son  can  tell ;  how  his  works 
have  tripled  their  value,  the  booksellers.  In  writing  on 
the  calamities  attending  the  love  of  literary  labour,  Mr. 
John  Nichols,  the  modest  annalist  of  the  literary  history 
of  the  last  century,  and  the  friend  of  half  the  departed 
genius  of  our  country,  cannot  but  occur  to  me.  He 
zealously  published  more  than  fifty  works,  illustrating 
the  literature  and  the  antiquities  of  the  country ;  labours 
not  given  to  the  world  without  great  sacrifices.  Bishop 
Hard,  with  friendly  solicitude,  writes  to  Mr.  Nicholson 
some  of  his  own  publications,  "  While  you  are  enrich- 
ing the  Antiquarian  Avorld  "  (and,  by  the  Life  of  Bowyer, 
may  be  added  the  Literary),  "  I  hope  you  do  not  forget 
yourself.  The  profession  of  an  author,  I  know  from 
experience,  is  not  a  lucrative  one.  I  only  mention  this 
because  I  see  a  large  catalogue  of  your  publications." 


13-i  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

At  another  time  the  Bishop  writes,  "  You  are  very 
good  to  excuse  my  freedom  with  you ;  but,  as  times  go, 
almost  any  trade  is  better  than  that  of  an  author,''  &c. 
On  these  notes  Mr.  Nichols  confesses,  "  I  have  had  some 
occasion  to  regret  that  I  did  not  attend  to  the  judicious 
suggestions."  "We  owe  to  the  late  Thomas  Davies,  the 
author  of  "  Garrick's  Life,"  and  other  literary  works, 
beautiful  editions  of  some  of  our  elder  poets,  which  are 
now  eagerly  sought  after,  yet,  though  all  his  publica- 
tions were  of  the  best  kinds,  and  are  now  of  increasing 
value,  the  taste  of  Tom  Davies  twice  ended  in  bank- 
ruptcy. It  is  to  be  lamented  for  the  cause  of  literature, 
that  even  a  bookseller  may  have  too  refined  a  taste  for 
his  trade ;  it  must  always  be  his  interest  to  float  on  the 
current  of  public  taste,  whatever  that  may  be  ;  should 
he  have  an  ambition  to  create  it,  he  will  be  anticipating 
a  more  cultivated  curiosity  by  half  a  century ;  thus  the 
business  of  a  bookseller  rarely  accords  with  the  design 
of  advancing  our  literature. 

The  works  of  literature,  it  is  then  but  too  evident,  re- 
ceive no  equivalent ;  let  this  be  recollected  by  him  who 
would  draw  his  existence  from  them.  A  young  writer 
often  resembles  that  imaginary  author  whom  Johnson, 
in  a  humorous  letter  in  "  The  Idler"  (Xo.  55),  represents 
as  having  composed  a  work  "  of  universal  curiosity,  com- 
puted that  it  would  call  for  many  editions  of  his  book, 
and  that  in  five  years  he  should  gain  fifteen  thousand 
pounds  by  the  sale  of  thirty  thousand  copies."  There 
arc,  indeed,  some  who  have  been  dazzled  by  the  good 
fortune  of  Gibbon,  Robertson,  and  Hume  ;  we  are  to  con- 


LABORIOUS   AUTHORS.  135 

sider  these  favourites,  not  merely  as  authors,  but  as 
possessing,  by  their  situation  in  life,  a  certain  indepen- 
dence which  preserved  them  from  the  vexations  of  the 
authors  I  have  noticed.  Observe,  however,  that  the  un- 
common sum  Gibbon  received  for  copyright,  though  it 
excited  the  astonishment  of  the  philosopher  himself,  was 
for  the  continued  labour  of  a  whole  life,  and  probably  the 
library  he  had  purchased  for  his  work  equalled  at  least 
in  cost  the  produce  of  his  pen  y  the  tools  cost  the  work- 
man as  much  as  he  obtained  for  his  work.  Six  thousand 
pounds  gained  on  these  terms  will  keep  an  author 
indigent. 

Many  great  labours  have  been  designed  by  their  au- 
thors even  to  be  posthumous,  prompted  only  by  their 
love  of  study  and  a  patriotic  zeal.  Bishop  Kennett's 
stupendous  "  Register  and  Chronicle,"  volume  I.,  is  one 
of  those  astonishing  labours  which  could  only  have  been 
produced  by  the  pleasure  of  study  urged  by  the  strong 
love  of  posterity.  *     It  is  a  diary  in  which  the  bishop, 

*  Kennett  was  characterised  throughout  life  by  a  strong  party  feel- 
ing, which  he  took  care  to  display  on  every  occasion.  He  was  born  at 
Dover  in  1GS0,  and  his  first  publication,  at  the  age  of  twenty,  gave 
great  offence  to  the  Whig  party ;  it  was  in  the  form  of  a  letter  from  a 
Student  at  Oxford  to  a  friend  in  the  country,  concerning  the  approach- 
ing parliament.  He  scarcely  ever  published  a  sermon  without  so  far 
mixing  party  matters  in  it  as  to  obtain  replies  and  rejoinders;  the 
rector  of  Whitechapel  employed  an  artist  to  place  his  head  on  Judas's 
shoulders  in  the  picture  of  the  Last  Supper  done  for  that  church,  and 
to  make  the  figure  unmistakeable,  placed  the  pntch  en  the  forehead 
which  Kennett  wore,  to  conceal  a  scar  he  got  by  the  bursting  of  a  gun. 
His  diligence  and  application  through  life  was  extraordinary.  He  as- 
sisted Anthony  Wood  in  collecting  materials  for  his  "  Athense  Oxoni- 
enses;"  and,  like  Oldys,  was  continually  employed  in  noting  books, 


136  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

one  of  our  most  studious  and  active  authors,  has  recorded 
every  matter  of  fact,  "  delivered  in  the  words  of  the  most 
authentic  books,  papers,  and  records."  The  design  was 
to  preserve  our  literary  history  from  the  Restoration. 
This  silent  labour  he  had  been  pursuing  all  his  life,  and 
published  the  first  volume  in  his  sixty-eighth  year,  the 
very  year  he  died.  But  he  was  so  sensible  of  the  coy- 
ness of  the  public  taste  for  what  he  calls,  in  a  letter  to 
a  literary  friend,  "  a  tedious  heavy  book,"  that  he  gave 
it  away  to  the  publisher.  "  The  volume,  too  large,  brings 
me  no  profit.  In  good  truth,  the  scheme  was  laid  for 
conscience'  sake,  to  restore  a  good  old  principle  that 
history  should  be  purely  matter  of  fact,  that  every  reader, 
by  examining  and  comparing,  may  make  out  a  history 
by  his  own  judgment.  I  have  collections  transcribed  for 
another  volume,  if  the  bookseller  will  run  the  hazard 
of  printing."  This  volume  has  never  appeared,  and  the 
bookseller  probably  lost  a  considerable  sum  by  the  one 
published,  which  valuable  volume  is  now  procured  with 
difficulty.* 

These  laborious  authors  have  commenced  their  literary 
life  with  a  glowing  ardour,  though  the  feelings  of  genius 
have  been  obstructed  by  those  numerous  causes  which 
occur  too  frequently  in  the  life  of  a  literary  man. 

or  in  forming  manuscript  collections  on  various  subjects,  all  of  which 
were  purchased  by  the  Earl  of  Shelburnc,  afterwards  Marquis  of  Lans- 
downe.  and  were  sold  with  the  rest  of  his  manuscripts  to  the  British 
Museum.  He  died  in  1714,  of  a  fever  he  had  contracted  in  a  journoy 
to  Italy.— Ed. 

*  See  Bishop  Kennett's  Letter  in  Nichols's  "  Life  of  Bowyer,"  vol  i 
p.  383. 


LABORIOUS   AUTHORS.  137 

Let  us  listen  to  Strutt,  whom  we  have  just  noticed, 
and  let  us  learn  what  he  proposed  doing  in  the  first  age 
of  fancy. 

Having  obtained  the  first  gold  medal  ever  given  at  the 
Royal  Academy,  he  writes  to  his  mother,  and  thus 
thanks  her  and  his  friends  for  their  deep  interest  in  his 
success : — 

"  I  will  at  least  strive  to  the  utmost  to  give  my  bene- 
factors no  reason  to  think  their  pains  thrown  away.  If  I 
should  not  be  able  to  abound  in  riches,  yet,  by  God's 
help,  I  will  strive  to  pluck  that  palm  which  the  greatest 
artists  of  foregoing  ages  have  done  before  me ;  I  will 
strive  to  leave  my  name  behind  me  in  the  world,  if  not  in 
the  splendour  that  some  have,  at  least  with  some  marks  of 
assiduity  and  study  •  which,  I  can  assure  you,  shall  never 
be  wanting  in  me.  Who  can  bear  to  hear  the  names  of 
Raphael,  Titian,  Michael  Angelo,  &c,  the  most  famous 
of  the  Italian  masters,  in  the  mouth  of  every  one,  and 
not  wish  to  be  like  them  ?  And  to  be  like  them,  we 
must  study  as  they  have  done,  take  such  pains,  and 
labour  continually  like  them  ;  the  which  shall  not  be 
wanting  on  my  side,  I  dare  affirm ;  so  that,  should  I  not 
succeed,  I  may  rest  contented,  and  say  I  have  done  my 
utmost.  God  has  blessed  me  with  a  mind  to  undertake. 
You,  dear  madam,  will  excuse  my  vanity  ;  you  know  me, 
from  my  childish  clays,  to  have  been  a  vain  boy,  always 
desirous  to  execute  something  to  gain  me  praises  from 
every  one ;  always  scheming  and  imitating  whatever  I 
6aw  done  by  anybody." 

And  when  Strutt  settled  in  the  metropolis,  and  studied 


138  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

at  the  British  Museum,  amid  all  the  stores  of  knowledge 
and  art,  his  imagination  delighted  to  expatiate  in  its 
future  prospects.  In  a  letter  to  a  friend  he  has  thus 
chronicled  his  feelings  : 

"I  would  not  only  be  a  great  antiquary,  but  a  refined 
thinker;  I  would  not  only  discover  antiquities,  but 
would,  by  explaining  their  use,  render  them  useful. 
Such  vast  funds  of  knowledge  lie  hid  in  the  antiquated 
remains  of  the  earlier  ages;  these  I  would  bring  forth, 
and  set  in  their  true  light." 

Poor  Strutt,  at  the  close  of  life,  was  returning  to  his 
own  first  and  natural  energies,  in  producing  a  work  of 
the  imagination.  He  had  made  considerable  progress  in 
one,  and  the  early  parts  which  he  had  finished  bear  the 
stamp  of  genius  ;  it  is  entitled  "  Queenhoo-hall,  a  Ro- 
mance of  ancient  times,"  full  of  the  pictivresque  manners, 
and  costume,  and  characters  of  the  age,  in  which  he  was 
so  conversant;  with  many  lyrical  pieces,  which  often  are 
full  of  poetic  feeling — but  he  was  called  off  from  the 
work  to  prepare  a  more  laborious  one.  "  Queenhoo-hall " 
remained  a  heap'  of  fragments  at  his  death  ;  except  the 
first  volume,  and  was  filled  up  by  a  stranger  hand.  The 
stranger  was  Sir  Walter  Scott,  and  "  Queenhoo-hall " 
was  the  origin  of  that  glorious  series  of  romances 
where  antiquarianism  has  taken  the  shape  of  imagina- 
tion. 

Writing  on  the  calamities  attached  to  literature,  I 
must  notice  one  of  a  more  recondite  nature,  yet  perhaps 
few  literary  agonies  are  more  keenly  felt.  I  would  not 
excite  an  undue  sympathy  for  a  class  of  writers  who  are 


LABORIOUS   AUTHORS.  139 

usually  considered  as  drudges;  but  the  present  case 
claims  our  sympathy. 

There  are  men  of  letters,  who,  early  in  life,  have 
formed  some  favourite  plan  of  literary  labour,  which 
they  have  unremittingly  pursued,  till,  sometimes  near 
the  close  of  life,  they  either  discover  their  inability 
to  terminate  it,  or  begin  to  depreciate  their  own  con- 
stant labour.  The  literary  architect  has  grown  gray 
over  his  edifice ;  and,  as  if  the  black  wand  of  enchantment 
had  waved  over  it,  the  colonnades  become  interminable, 
the  pillars  seem  to  want  a  foundation,  and  all  the  rich 
materials  he  had  collected  together,  lie  before  him  in 
all  the  disorder  of  ruins.  It  may  be  urged  that  the 
reward  of  literary  labour,  like  the  consolations  of  virtue, 
must  be  drawn  with  all  their  sweetness  from  itself;  or, 
that  if  the  author  be  incompetent,  he  must  pay  the  price 
of  his  incapacity.  This  may  be  Stoicism,  but  it  is  not 
humanity.  The  truth  is,  there  is  always  a  latent  love  of 
fame,  that  prompts  to  this  strong  devotion  of  labour ; 
and  he  who  has  given  a  long  life  to  that  which  he  has  so 
much  desired,  and  can  never  enjoy,  might  well  be  ex- 
cused receiving  our  insults,  if  he  cannot  extort  our  pity. 

A  remarkable  instance  occurs  in  the  fate  of  the  late 
Rev.  William  Cole  ;*  he  was  the  college  friend  of  Wal- 

*  The  best  account  of  the  Rev.  Win.  Cole  is  to  be  found  in  Nichols's 
"Literary  Anecdotes  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,"  vol.  i.  His  life  was 
eventless,  and  passed  in  studious  drudgery.  He  had  all  that  power 
of  continuous  application  which  will  readily  form  immense  manuscript 
collections.  In  this  way  his  life  was  passed,  occasionally  aiding  from 
his  enormous  stores  the  labours  of  others.  He  was  an  early  and  inti- 
mate acquaintance  of  Horace  "Walpole's  and  they  visited  France  to- 


140  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

pole,  Mason,  and  Gray;  a  striking  proof  how  dissimilar 
habits  and  opposite  tastes  and  feelings  can  associate  in 
literary  friendship;  for  Cole,  indeed,  the  public  had  in- 
formed him  that  his  friends  were  poets  and  men  of  wit  ; 
and  for  them,  Cole's  patient  and  curious  turn  was  useful, 
and,  by  its  extravagant  trifling,  must  have  been  very 
amusing.  lie  had  a  gossip's  ear,  and  a  tatler's  pen — 
and,  among  better  things,  wrote  down  every  grain  of 
literary  scandal  his  insatiable  and  minute  curiosity  could 
lick  up;  as  patient  and  voracious  as  an  ant-eater,  he 
6tretched  out  his  tongue  till  it  was  covered  by  the  tiny 
creatures,  and  drew  them  all  in  at  one  digestion.  All 
these  tales  were  registered  with  the  utmost  simplicity,  as 
the  reporter  received  them;  but,  being  but  tales,  the 
exactness  of  his  truth  made  them  still  more  dangerous 
lies,  by  being  perpetuated  ;  in  his  reflections  he  spared 
neither  friend  nor  foe  ;  yet,  still  anxious  after  truth,  and 

gether  in  1765.  Browne  Willis,  the  antiquary,  gave  him  the  rectory 
of  Bleeheley,  in  Buckinghamshire,  and  he  was  afterwards  presented  to 
the  vicarage  of  Burnham,  near  Eton.  He  died  in  1782.  in  the  C8th 
year  of  his  a?e.  having  chiefly  employed  a  long  life  in  noting  on  all 
Eubjects,  until  his  manuscripts  became  a  small  library  of  themselves, 
which  he  bequeathed  to  the  British  Museum,  with  an  order  that  they 
6houM  not  be  opened  for  twenty  years.  They  are  correctly  character- 
ised by  Nichols:  he  says,  "many  of  the  volumes  exhibit  striking 
traits  of  Mr.  Cole's  own  character;  and  a  man  of  sufficient  leisure 
micrht  pick  out  of  them  abundance  of  curicis  matter."  He  left  a  diary 
behind  him  which  for  puerility  could  not  be  exceeded,  and  of  which 
Nichols  gives  several  ridiculous  specimens.  If  his  parrot  died,  or  his 
man-servant  was  bled;  if  he  sent  a  loin  of  pork  to  a  friend,  and  got  a 
quarter  of  lamb  in  return;  '"drank  coffee  with  Mrs.  Willis," or  "sent 
two  French  wig3  to  a  London  barber."  all  is  faithfully  recorded.  It 
is  a  true  picture  of  a  lover  of  labour,  whose  oonstant  energy  must  be 
employed,  and  will  write  even  if  the  labour  be  worthless. — Ed. 


LABORIOUS   AUTHORS.  ]±\ 

usually  telling  lies,  it  is  very  amusing  to  observe,  that, 
as  he  proceeds,  he  very  laudably  contradicts,  or  explains 
away  in  subsequent  memoranda  what  he  had  before 
registered.  Walpole,  in  a  correspondence  of  forty  years, 
he  was  perpetually  flattering,  though  he  must  imper- 
fectly have  relished  his  fine  taste,  while  he  abhorred 
his  more  liberal  principles,  to  which  sometimes  he  ad- 
dressed a  submissive  remonstrance.  He  has  at  times 
written  a  letter  coolly,  and,  at  the  same  moment,  chron- 
icled his  suppressed  feelings  in  his  diary,  with  all  the 
flame  and  splutter  of  his  strong  prejudices.  He  was 
expressly  nicknamed  Cardinal  Cole.  These  scandalous 
chronicles,  which  only  show  the  violence  of  his  preju- 
dices, without  the  force  of  genius,  Oi  the  acutcness  of 
penetration,  were  ordered  not  to  be  opened  till  twenty 
years  after  his  decease;  he  wished  to  do  as  little  mis- 
chief as  he  could,  but  loved  to  do  some.  I  well  remem- 
ber the  cruel  anxiety  which  prevailed  in  the  nineteenth 
year  of  these  inclosures ;  it  spoiled  the  digestions  of 
several  of  our  literati  who  had  had  the  misfortune  of 
Cole's  intimate  friendship,  or  enmity.  One  of  these  was 
the  writer  of  the  Life  of  Thomas  Baker,  the  Cambridge 
Antiquary,  who  prognosticated  all  the  evil  he  among 
others  was  to  endure  ;  and,  writhing  in  fancy  under  the 
whip  not  yet  untwisted,  justly  enough  exclaims  in  his 
agony,  "  The  attempt  to  keep  these  characters  from  the 
public  till  the  subjects  of  them  shall  be  no  more,  seems 
to  be  peculiarly  cruel  and  ungenerous,  since  it  is  pre- 
cluding them  from  vindicating  themselves  from  such 
injurious  aspersions,  as  their  friends,  perhaps  however 


142  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

willing,  may  at  that  distance  of  time  be  incapable  of 
removing."  With  this  author,  Mr.  Musters,  Cole  had 
quarrelled  so  often,  that  Masters  -writes,  "  I  am  well  ac- 
quainted with  the  fickleness  of  his  disposition  for  more 
than  forty  years  past." 

When  the  lid  was  removed  from  this  Pandora's  box, 
it  happened  that  some  of  his  intimate  friends  were  alive 
to  perceive  in  what  strange  figures  they  were  exhibited 
by  their  quondam  admirer  ! 

Cole,  however,  bequeathed  to  the  nation,  among  his 
unpublished  works,  a  vast  mass  of  antiquities  and  his- 
torical collections,  and  one  valuable  legacy  of  literary 
materials.  "When  I  turned  over  the  papers  of  this  liter- 
ary antiquary,  I  found  the  recorded  cries  of  a  literary 
martyr. 

Cole  had  passed  a  long  life  in  the  pertinacious  labour 
of  forming  an  "  Athena?  Cantabrigienses,"  and  other 
literary  collections — designed  as  a  companion  to  the 
work  of  Anthony  Wood.  These  mighty  labours  exist  in 
more  than  fifty  folio  volumes  in  his  own  writing.  He 
began  these  collections  about  the  year  1T45;  in  a  fly- 
leaf of  1777  I  found  the  following  melancholy  state  of 
\i\<  feelings  and  a  literary  confession,  as  forcibly  ex- 
pressed as  it  is  painful  to  read,  when  we  consider  that 
they  are  the  wailings  of  a  most  zealous  votary : 

"In  good  truth,  whoever  undertakes  this  drudgery  of 

an  'Athenas  Cantabrigienses'  must  be  contented  with  no 

prospect  of  credit  and  reputation  to  himself,  and  with 

the   mortifying   reflection  that    after  all    his    pains    and 

]y,  through  life,  he  must  he  looked  upon  in  a  humble 


LABORIOUS   AUTHORS.  143 

light,  and  only  as  a  journeyman  to  Anthony  "Wood, 
whose  excellent  book  of  the  same  sort  will  ever  pi-ecludc 
any  other,  who  shall  follow  him  in  the  same  track,  from 
all  hopes  of  fame ;  and  will  only  represent  him  as  an  imi- 
tator of  so  original  a  pattern.  For,  at  this  time  of  day, 
all  great  characters,  both  Cantabrigians  and  Oxonians, 
are  already  published  to  the  world,  either  in  his  book,  or 
vai-ious  others ;  so  that  the  collection,  unless  the  same 
characters  are  reprinted  here,  must  be  made  up  of  second- 
rate  persons,  and  the  refuse  of  authorship. — However,  as 
I  have  begun,  and  made  so  large  a  progress  in  this  under- 
taking, it  is  death  to  think  of  leaving  it  off,  though,  from 
the  former  considerations,  so  little  credit  is  to  be  ex 
pected  from  it." 

Such  were  the  fruits,  and  such  the  agonies,  of  nearly 
half  a  century  of  assiduous  and  zealous  literary  labour ! 
Cole  urges  a  strong  claim  to  be  noticed  among  our  lit 
erary  calamities.  Another  of  his  miseries  was  his  uncer 
tainty  in  what  manner  he  should  dispose  of  his  collections: 
and  he  has  put  down  this  naive  memorandum — "  I  have 
long  wavered  how  to  dispose  of  all  my  MS.  volumes  ;  to 
give  them  to  King's  College,  would  be  to  throw  them 
into  a  horsepond  ;  and  I  had  as  lieve  do  one  as  the  other; 
they  are  generally  so  conceited  of  their  Latin  and  Greek, 
that  all  other  studies  are  barbarism.'1'1  * 

The  dread  of  incompleteness  has  attended  the  life-la- 
bours (if  the  expression  may  be  allowed)  of  several  other 

*  Cole's  collection,  ultimately  bequeathed  by  him  to  the  British 
Museum,  is  comprised  in  92  volumes,  and  is  arranged  among  the  ad- 
ditional manuscripts  there,  of  which  it  forms  Nos.  5798  to  5887. — Ed. 


14-i  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

authors  who  have  never  published  their  works.  Such 
was  the  learned  Bishop  Lloyd,  and  the  Rev.  Thomas 
Baker,  who  was  first  engaged  in  the  same  pursuit  as  Cole, 
and  carried  it  on  to  the  extent  of  about  forty  volumes  in 
folio.  Lloyd  is  described  by  Burnet  as  having  "many 
volumes  of  materials  upon  all  subjects,  so  that  he  could, 
with  very  little  labour,  write  on  any  of  them,  with  more 
life  in  his  imagination,  and  a  truer  judgment,  than  may 
seem  consistent  with  such  a  laborious  course  of  study  ; 
but  he  did  not  lay  out  his  learning  with  the  same  dili- 
gence as  he  laid  it  in."  It  is  mortifying  to  learn,  in  the 
words  of  Johnson,  that  "he  was  always  hesitating  and 
inquiring,  raising  objections,  and  removing  them,  and 
waiting  for  clearer  light  and  fuller  discovery."'  Many 
of  the  labours  of  this  learned  bishop  were  at  length  con- 
sumed in  the  kitchen  of  his  descendant.  "  Baker  (says 
Johnson),  after  many  years  passed  in  biography,  left  his 
manuscripts  to  be  buried  in  a  library,  because  that  was 
imperfect  which  could  never  be  perfected."  And  to  com- 
plete the  absurdity,  or  to  heighten  the  calamity  which 
the  want  of  these  useful  labours  makes  every  literary 
man  feel,  half  of  the  collections  of  Baker  sleep  in  their 
dust  in  a  turret  of  the  University ;  while  the  other,  de- 
posited in  our  national  library  at  the  British  Museum, 
and  frequently  used,  are  rendered  imperfect  by  this  un- 
natural divorce. 

I  will  illustrate  the  character  of  a  laborious  author  by 
that  of  Anthony  Wood. 

"Wood's  "  Athena?  Oxonicnses  "  is  a  history  of  near  a 
thousand  of  our  native  authors ;  he  paints  their  charac- 


LABORIOUS    AUTHORS.  145 

ters,  and  enters  into  the  spirit  of  their  writings.  But  au- 
thors of  this  complexion,  and  works  of  this  natui'e,  are 
liable  to  be  slighted ;  for  the  fastidious  are  petulant,  the 
volatile  inexperienced,  and  those  who  cultivate  a  single 
province  in  literature  are  disposed,  too  often,  to  lay  all 
others  under  a  state  of  interdiction. 

Warburton,  in  a  work  thrown  out  in  the  heat  of  un 
chastised  youth,  and  afterwards  withdrawn  from  public 
inquiry,  has  said  of  the  "  Athense  Oxonienses  " — 

"  Of  all  those  writings  given  us  by  the  learned  Oxford 
antiquary,  there  is  not  one  that  is  not  a  disgrace  to  let- 
ters ;  most  of  them  are  so  to  common  sense,  and  some 
even  to  human  nature.  Yet  how  set  out !  how  tricked ! 
how  adorned  !  how  extolled  !"  * 

The  whole  tenor  of  Wood's  life  testifies,  as  he  himself 
tells  us,  that  "  books  and  MSS.  formed  his  Elysium,  and 
he  wished  to  be  dead  to  the  world."  This  sovereign 
passion  marked  him  early  in  life,  and  the  image  of  death 
could  not  disturb  it.  When  young,  "  he  walked  mostly 
alone,  was  given  much  to  thinking  and  melancholy." 
The  delicice  of  his  life  were  the  more  liberal  studies  of 
painting  and  music,  intermixed  with  those  of  antiquity  ; 
nor  could  his  family,  who  checked  such  unproductive 
studies,  ever  check  his  love  of  them.  With  what  a  firm 
and  noble  spirit  he  says — 

"  When  he  came  to  full  years,  he  perceived  it  was  his 
natural  genie,  and  he  could  not  avoid  them — they  crowded 
on  him — he  could  never  give  a  reason  why  he  should  de- 

*  In  his  "  Critical  and  Philosophical  Enquiry  into  the  Causes  of 
Prodigies." 

10 


14:6  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

light  in  those  studies,  more  than  in  others,  so  prevalent 
was  nature,  mixed  with  a  generosity  of  mind,  and  a  hatred 
to  all  that  was  servile,  sneaking,  or  advantageous  for 
lucre-sake." 

These  are  not  the  roundings  of  a  period,  but  the  pure 
expressions  of  a  man  who  had  all  the  simplicity  of  child- 
hood in  his  feelings.  Could  such  vehement  emotions 
have  been  excited  in  the  unanimated  breast  of  a  clod  of 
literature?  Thus  early  Anthony  "Wood  betrayed  the 
characteristics  of  genius  ;  nor  did  the  literary  passion 
desert  him  in  his  last  moments.  With  his  dying  hands 
he  still  grasped  his  beloved  papers,  and  his  last  mortal 
thoughts  dwelt  on  his  AthencB  Oxonienses* 

It  is  no  common  occurrence  to  view  an  author  speech- 
less in  the  hour  of  death,  yet  fervently  occupied  by  his 
posthumous  fame.  Two  friends  went  into  his  study  to 
sort  that  vast  multitude  of  papers,  notes,  letters — his 
more  private  ones  he  had  ordered  not  to  be  opened  for 
seven  years ;  about  two  bushels  full  were  ordered  for  the 
fire,  which  they  had  lighted  for  the  occasion.  "  As  he 
was  expiring,  he  expressed  both  his  knowledge  and  ap- 
probation of  what  was  done  by  throwing  out  his  hands." 

Turn  over  his  Herculean  labour ;  do  not  admire  less 
bis  fearlessness  of  danger,  than  his  indefatigable  pursuit 
of  truth.  He  wrote  of  his  contemporaries  as  if  he  felt  a 
right  to  judge  of  them,  and  as  if  he  were  living  in  the 

*  This,  his  most  valuable  work,  has  been  most  carefully  edited,  with 
numerous  additions  by  Dr.  Bliss,  and  is  the  great  authority  for  Lives 
of  Oxford  men.  Its  author,  born  at  Oxford  in  1G32.  died  there  in 
1695,  having  devoted  his  life  strictly  to  study. — Ed. 


LABORIOUS    AUTHORS.  147 

succeeding  age  ;  courtier,  fanatic,  or  papist,  were  much 
alike  to  honest  Anthony  ;  for  he  professes  himself  "  such 
an  universal  lover  of  all  mankind,  that  he  wished  there 
might  he  no  cheat  put  upon  readers  and  writers  in  the 
business  of  commendations.  And  (says  he)  since  every 
one  will  have  a  double  balance,  one  for  his  own  party, 
and  another  for  his  adversary,  all  he  could  do  is  to  amass 
together  what  every  side  thinks  will  make  best  weight 
for  themselves.     Let  posterity  hold  the  scales." 

Anthony  might  have  added,  "  I  have  held  them." 
This  uninterrupted  activity  of  his  spirits  was  the  action 
of  a  sage,  not  the  bustle  of  one  intent  merely  on  heaping 
up  a  book. 

"  He  never  wrote  in  post,  with  his  body  and  thoughts 
in  a  hurry,  but  in  a  fixed  abode,  and  with  a  deliberate 
pen.  And  he  never  concealed  an  ungrateful  truth,  nor 
flourished  over  a  weak  place,  but  in  sincerity  of  mean- 
ing and  expression." 

Anthony  Wood  cloistered  an  athletic  mind,  a  hermit 
critic  abstracted  from  the  world,  existing  more  with  pos- 
terity than  amid  his  contemporaries.  His  prejudices 
were  the  keener  from  the  very  energies  of  the  mind  that 
produced  them ;  but,  as  he  practises  no  deception  on  his 
reader,  we  know  the  causes  of  his  anger  or  his  love. 
And,  as  an  original  thinker  creates  a  style  for  himself,  from 
the  circumstance  of  not  attending  to  style  at  all,  but  to 
feeling,  so  Anthony  Wood's  has  all  the  peculiarity  of  the 
writer.  Critics  of  short  views  have  attempted  to  screen 
it  from  ridicule,  attributing  his  uncouth  style  to  the  age 
he  lived  in.     But  not  one  in  his  own  time  nor  since,  has 


liS  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

composed  in  the  same  style.  The  austerity  and  the 
quickness  of  his  feelings  vigorously  stamped  all  their 
roughness  and  vivacity  on  every  sentence.  He  describes 
his  own  style  as  "an  honest,  plain  English  dress, -without 
flourishes  or  affectation  of  style,  as  best  becomes  a  history 
of  truth  and  matters  of  fact.  It  is  the  first  (work)  of  its 
nature  that  has  ever  been  printed  in  our  own,  or  in  any 
other  mother-tongue." 

It  is,  indeed,  an  honest  A[ontaigne-like  simplicity. 
Acrimonious  and  cynical,  he  is  always  sincere,  and 
never  dull.  Old  Anthony  to  me  is  an  admirable  charac- 
ter-painter, for  anger  and  love  are  often  picturesque. 
And  among  our  literary  historians  he  might  be  compared, 
for  the  effect  he  produces,  to  Albert  Durer,  whose  kind  of 
antique  rudeness  has  a  sharp  outline,  neither  beautiful 
nor  flowing  ;  and,  without  a  genius  for  the  magic  of  light 
and  shade,  he  is  too  close  a  copier  of  Nature  to  affect  us 
by  ideal  forms. 

The  independence  of  his  mind  nerved  his  ample  vol- 
umes, his  fortitude  he  displayed  in  the  contest  with  the 
University  itself,  and  his  firmness  in  censuring  Lord 
Clarendon,  the  head  of  his  own  party.  Could  such  a 
work,  and  such  an  original  manner,  have  proceeded  from 
an  ordinary  intellect  ?  "Wit  may  sparkle,  and  sarcasm 
may  bite;  but  the  cause  of  literature  is  injured  when  the 
industry  of  such  a  mind  is  ranked  with  that  of  "  the  hew- 
ers of  wood,  and  drawers  of  water :"  ponderous  compilers 
of  creeping  commentators.  Such  a  work  as  the  "  Athena? 
Oxonienses'1  involved  in  its  pursuits  some  of  the  higher 
qualities  of  the  intellect;  a  voluntary  devotion  of  life,  a 


LABORIOUS    AUTHORS.  14$ 

sacrifice  of  personal  enjoyments,  a  noble  design  combin- 
ing many  views,  some  present  and  some  prescient,  a  clear 
vigorous  spirit  equally  diffused  over  a  vast  surface.  But 
it  is  the  hard  fate  of  authors  of  this  class  to  be  levelled 
with  their  inferiors  ! 

Let  us  exhibit  one  more  picture  of  the  calamities  of  a 
laborious  author,  in  the  character  of  Joshua  Barnes, 
editor  of  Homer,  Euripides,  and  Anacreon,  and  the  wri- 
ter of  a  vast  number  of  miscellaneous  compositions  in 
history  and  poetry.  Besides  the  works  he  published,  he 
left  behind  him  nearly  fifty  unfinished  ones  ;  many  were 
epic  poems,  all  intended  to  be  in  twelve  books,  and  some 
had  reached  their  eighth !  His  folio  volume  of  "  The 
History  of  Edward  III."  is  a  labour  of  valuable  research. 
He  wrote  with  equal  facility  in  Greek,  Latin,  and  his 
own  language,  and  he  wrote  all  his  days  ;  and,  in  a  word, 
having  little  or  nothing  but  his  Greek  professorship,  not 
exceeding  forty  pounds  a  year,  Barnes,  who  had  a  great 
memory,  a  little  imagination,  and  no  judgment,  saw  the 
close  of  a  life,  devoted  to  the  studies  of  humanity,  settle 
around  him  in  gloom  and  despair.  The  great  idol  of  his 
mind  was  the  edition  of  his  Homer,  which  seems  to  have 
completed  his  ruin ;  he  was  haunted  all  his  days  with  a 
notion  that  he  was  persecuted  by  envy,  and  much  un- 
dervalued in  the  world ;  the  sad  consolation  of  the 
secondary  and  third-rate  authors,  who  often  die  persuad- 
ed of  the  existence  of  ideal  enemies.  To  be  enabled  to 
C/ublish  his  Homer  at  an  enormous  charge,  he  wrote  a 
poem,  the  design  of  which  is  to  prove  that  Solomon  was 
the  author  of  the  Iliad ;  and  it  has  been  said  that  this 


150  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

was  done  to  interest  his  wife,  who  had  some  property,  to 
lend  her  aid  towards  the  publication  of  so  divine  a  work. 
This  happy  pun  was  applied  for  his  epitaph  : — 

Joshua  Barxes, 
Felicis  memoriae,  judicium  expectans. 

Here  lieth 
Joshua  Barxes, 
Of  happy  memory,  awaiting  judgment! 

The  year  before  he  died  he  addressed  the  following  let- 
ter to  the  Earl  of  Oxford,  which  I  transcribe  from  the 
original.  It  is  curious  to  observe  how  the  veteran  and 
unhappy  scribbler,  after  his  vows  of  retirement  from  the 
world  of  letters,  thoroughly  disgusted  with  "  all  human 
learning,"  gently  hints  to  his  patron,  that  he  has  ready 
for  the  press,  a  singular  variety  of  contrasted  works  ;  yet 
even  then  he  did  not  venture  to  disclose  one-tenth  part 
of  his  concealed  treasures  ! 

"to  the  earl  of  oxford. 

"My  Hon.  Lord,  Oct.  16,1711. 

"  This,  not  in  any  doubt  of  your  goodness  and  high 
respect  to  learning,  for  I  have  fresh  instances  of  it  every 
day  ;  but  because  I  am  prevented  in  my  design  of  wait- 
ing personally  on  you,  being  called  away  by  my  business 
for  Cambridge,  to  read  Greek  lectures  this  term;  and  my 
circumstances  are  pressing,  being,  through  the  combina- 
tion of  booksellers,  and  the  meaner  arts  of  others,  too 
much  prejudiced  in  the  sale.  I  am  not  neither  sufficiently 
ascertained  whether  my  Homer  and  letters  came  to  your 


LABORIOUS    AUTHORS.  J51 

honour ;  surely  the  vast  charges  of  that  edition  has  al- 
most broke  ray  courage,  there  being  much  more  trouble 
in  putting  off"  the  impression,  and  contending  with  a  sub- 
tle and  unkind  world,  than  in  all  the  study  and  manage- 
ment of  the  press. 

"  Others,  my  lord,  are  younger,  and  their  hopes  and 
helps  are  fresher ;  I  have  done  as  much  in  the  way  of 
learning  as  any  man  living,  but  have  received  less  en- 
couragement than  any,  having  nothing  but  my  Greek 
professorship,  which  is  but  forty  pounds  per  annum,  that 
I  can  call  my  own,  and  more  than  half  of  that  is  taken 
up  by  my  expenses  of  lodging  and  diet  in  terme  time  at 
Cambridge. 

"  I  was  obliged  to  take  up  three  hundred  and  fifty 
pounds  on  interest  towards  this  last  work,  whereof  I  still 
owe  two  hundred  pounds,  and  two  hundred  more  for  the 
printing ;  the  whole  expense  arising  to  about  one  thou- 
sand pounds.  I  have  lived  in  the  university  above 
thirty  years,  fellow  of  a  college  now  above  forty  years' 
standing,  and  fifty-eight  years  of  age  ;  am  bachelor  of 
divinity,  and  have  preached  before  kings  ;  but  am  now 
your  honour's  suppliant,  and  would  fain  retire  from  the 
study  of  humane  learning,  which  has  been  so  little  bene- 
ficial to  me,  if  I  might  have  a  little  prebend,  or  sufficient 
anchor  to  lay  hold  on ;  only  I  have  two  or  three  matters 
ready  for  the  press — an  ecclesiastical  history,  Latin ;  an 
heroic  poem  of  the  Black  Prince,  Latin ;  another  of 
Queen  Anne,  English,  finished  ;  a  treatise  of  Colunines, 
Latin ;  and  an  accurate  treatise  about  Homer,  Greek, 
Latin,  &c.     I  would  fain  be  permitted   the  honour   to 


153  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

make  use  of  your  name  in  some  one,  or  most  of  those, 
and  to  be,  &c,  "  Joshua  Barnes."  * 

He  died  nine  months  afterwards.  Homer  did  not  im- 
prove iu  sale;  and  the  sweets  of  patronage  were  not 
even  tasted.  This,  then,  is  the  history  of  a  man  of  great 
learning,  of  the  most  pertinacious  industry,  but  some- 
what allied  to  the  family  of  the  Scribleri. 


THE   DESPAIR   OF    YOUNG    POETS. 

TXXILLLAM  PATTISOX  was  a  young  poet  who  per- 
*  *  ished  in  his  twentieth  year  ;  his  character  and  his 
fate  resemble  those  of  Chatterton.  He  was  one  more 
child  of  that  family  of  genius,  whose  passions,  like  the 
torch,  kindle  but  to  consume  themselves. 

The  youth  of  Pattison  was  that  of  a  poet.  Many 
become  irrecoverably  poets  by  local  influence  ;  and  Beat- 
tie  could  hardly  have  thrown  his  "  Minstrel  "  into  a 
more  poetical  solitude  than  the  singular  spot  which  was 
haunted  by  our  young  bard.  His  first  misfortune  was 
that  of  having  an  anti-poetical  parent;  his  next  was  that 
of  having  discovered  a  spot  which  confirmed  his  poetical 
habits,  inspiring  all  the  melancholy  and  sensibility  he 
loved  to  indulge.  This  spot,  which  in  his  fancy  resem- 
bled  some  favourite  description  in  Cowley,  lie  called 
"  Cowley's  Walk."  Some  friend,  who  was  himself  no 
common  painter  of  fancy,  has  delineated  the  whole  scenery 
with  minute  touches,  and  a  freshness  of  colouring,  warm 
*  Harleian  J1SS.  7523. 


THE   DESPAIR   OF   YOUXG   POETS.  153 

with  reality.  Such  a  poetical  habitation  becomes  a  part 
of  the  poet  himself,  reflecting  his  character,  and  even  de- 
scriptive of  his  manners. 

"On  one  side  of  'Cowley's  Walk'  is  a  huge  rock, 
grown  over  with  moss  and  ivy  climbing  on  its  sides,  and 
in  some  parts  small  trees  spring  out  of  the  crevices  of 
the  roek ;  at  the  bottom  are  a  wild  plantation  of  irregular 
trees,  in  every  part  looking  aged  and  venerable.  Among 
these  cavities,  one  larger  than  the  rest  was  the  cave  he 
loved  to  sit  in :  arched  like  a  canopy,  its  rustic  borders 
were  edged  with  ivy  hanging  down,  overshadowing  the 
place,  and  hence  he  called  it  (for  poets  must  give  a  name 
to  every  object  they  love)  '  Hederinda,'  bearing  ivy.  At 
the  foot  of  this  grotto  a  stream  of  water  ran  along  the 
walk,  so  that  its  level  path  had  trees  and  water  on  one 
side,  and  a  wild  rough  precipice  on  the  other.  In  winter, 
this  spot  looked  full  of  horror — the  naked  trees,  the  dark 
rock,  and  the  desolate  waste  ;  but  in  the  spring,  the  sing- 
ing of  the  birds,  the  fragrancy  of  the  flowers,  and  the 
murmuring  of  the  stream,  blended  all  their  enchant- 
ment." 

Here,  in  the  heat  of  the  day,  he  escaped  into  the 
"  Hederinda,"  and  shared  with  friends  his  rapture  and 
his  solitude ;  and  here  through  summer  nights,  in  the 
light  of  the  moon,  he  meditated  and  melodised  his  verses 
by  the  gentle  fall  of  the  waters.  Thus  was  Pattison 
fixed  and  bound  up  in  the  strongest  spell  the  demon  of 
poetry  ever  drew  around  a  susceptible  and  careless 
youth. 

He  was  now  a  decided  poet.     At  Sidney  College,  in 


154  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

Cambridge,  he  was  greatly  loved  ;  till,  on  a  quarrel  with 
a  rigid  tutor,  he  rashly  cut  his  name  out  of  the  college 
book,  and  quitted  it  for  ever  in  utter  thoughtlessness  and 
gaiety,  leaving  his  gown  behind,  as  his  locum  tenens,  to 
make  his  apology,  by  pinning  on  it  a  satirical  farewell. 

Whoever  gives  himself  the  pains  to  stoop, 
And  take  my  venerable  tatters  up, 
To  his  presuming  inquisition  I, 
In  loco  Pattisoni,  thus  reply : 
"  Tired  with  the  senseless  jargon  of  the  gown, 
My  master  left  the  college  for  the  town, 
And  scorns  his  precious  minutes  to  regale 
"With  wretched  college-wit  and  college-ale." 

He  flew  to  the  metropolis  to  take  up  the  trade  of  a 
poet. 

A  translation  of  Ovid's  "  Epistles  "  had  engaged  his 
attention  during  two  years  ;  his  own  genius  seemed  in- 
exhaustible ;  and  pleasure  and  fame  were  awaiting  the 
poetical  emigrant.  He  resisted  all  kind  importunities  to 
return  to  college ;  he  coidd  not  endure  submission,  and 
declares  "  his  spirit  cannot  bear  control."  One  friend 
"fears  the  innumerable  temptations  to  which  one  of  his 
complexion  is  liable  in  such  a  populous  place."  Pattison 
was  much  loved  ;  he  had  all  the  generous  impetuosity  of 
youthful  genius ;  but  he  had  resolved  on  running  the 
perilous  career  of  literary  glory,  and  lie  added  one  more 
to  the  countless  thousands  who  perish  in  obscurity. 

His  first  letters  are  written  with  the  same  spirit  that 
distinguishes  Chattcrton's  ;  all  he  hopes  he  seems  to  re- 
alise. He  mixes  among  the  wits,  dates  from  Button's, 
and  drinks  with  Concanen  healths  to  college  friends,  till 


THE   DESPAIR  OF   YOUNG   POETS.  155 

they  lose  their  own ;  more  dangerous  Muses  condescend 
to  exhibit  themselves  to  the  young  poet  in  the  park  ;  and 
he  was  to  be  introduced  to  Pope.  All  is  exultation ! 
Miserable  youth  !  The  first  thought  of  prudence  appears 
in  a  resolution  of  soliciting  subscriptions  from  all  persons, 
for  a  volume  of  poems. 

His  young  friends  at  college  exerted  their  warm  pat- 
ronage ;  those  in  his  native  North  condemn  him,  and  save 
their  crowns  ;  Pope  admits  of  no  interview,  but  lends  his 
name,  and  bestows  half-a-crown  for  a  volume  of  poetry, 
which  he  did  not  want ;  the  poet  wearies  kindness,  and 
would  extort  charity  even  from  brother-poets ;  petitions 
lords  and  ladies;  and,  as  his  wants  grow  on  him,  his 
shame  decreases. 

How  the  scene  has  changed  in  a  few  months !  He  ac- 
knowledges to  a  friend,  that  "  his  heart  was  broke  through 
the  misfortunes  he  had  fallen  under ;"  he  declares  "  he  feels 
himself  near  the  borders  of  death."  In  moments  like 
these  he  probably  composed  the  following  lines,  awfully 
addressed, 

AD   CCELUMl 

Good  heaven !  this  mystery  of  life  explain, 
Nor  let  me  think  I  bear  the  load  in  vain  ; 
Lest,  with  the  tedious  passage  cheerless  grown, 
Urged  by  despair,  I  throw  the  burden  down. 

But  the  torture  of  genius,  when  all  its  passions  are 
strained  on  the  rack,  was  never  more  pathetically 
expressed  than  in  the  following  letter : — 

"Sir, — If  you  was  ever  touched  with  a  sense  of 
humanity,  consider  my  condition :  what  I  atn,  my  pro- 


15G  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

posals    will    inform    you ;    what    I  have    been,    Sidney 

College,  in  Cambridge,  ean  witness;  but  what  I  shall  1)6 

some  few  hours  hence,  I  tremble  to  think !     Spare  my 

blushes  ! — I  have  not  enjoyed  the   common   necessaries 

of  life    for   these   two    days,   and    can   hardly  hold  to 

subscribe  myself, 

"  Yours,  &c." 

The  picture  is  finished — it  admits  not  of  another 
stroke.  Such  was  the  complete  misery  which  Savage, 
Boyse,  Chatterton,  and  more  innocent  spirits  devoted  to 
literature,  have  endured — but  not  long — for  they  must 
perish  in  their  youth  ! 

Henry  Carey  was  one  of  our  most  popular  poets ; 
he,  indeed,  has  unluckily  met  with  only  dictionary 
critics,  or  what  is  as  fatal  to  genius,  the  cold  and  undis- 
tinguishing  commendation  of  grave  men  on  subjects 
of  humour,  wit,  and  the  lighter  poetry.  The  works  of 
Carey  do  not  appear  in  any  of  our  great  collections, 
where  Walsh,  Duke,  and  Yalden  slumber  on  the  shelf. 

Yet  Carey  was  a  true  son  of  the  Muses,  and  the  mo^t 
successful  writer  in  our  language.  He  is  the  author  of 
several  little  national  poems.  In  early  life  he  success- 
fully burlesqued  the  affected  versification  of  Ambrose 
Philips,  in  his  baby  poems,  to  which  he  gave  the  fortu- 
nate appellation  of  "  Namby  JPamby,  a  panegyric  on  the 
new  versification ;"  a  term  descriptive  in  sound  of  those 
chiming  follies,  and  now  become  a  technical  term  in 
modern  criticism.  Carey's  "  Namby  Pamby"  was  at  first 
considered  by  Swift  as  the  satirical  effusion  of  Pope,  and 
by  Popo  as  the  humorous  ridicule  of  Swift.     His  ballad 


THE   DESPAIR   OP   YOUNG   POETS.  157 

of  "  Sally  in  our  Alley"  was  more  than  once  commended 
for  its  nature  by  Addison,  and  is  sung  to  this  day.  Of 
the  national  song,  "God  save  the  King,"  it  is  supposed 
he  was  the  author  both  of  the  words  and  of  the  music.* 
He  was  very  successful  on  the  stage,  and  Avrote  admir- 
able burlesques  of  the  Italian  Opera,  in  "The  Dragon 
of  Wantley,"  and  "  The  Dragoness ;"  and  the  mock 
tragedy  of  "  Chrononhotonthologos"  is  not  forgotten. 
Among  his  Poems  lie  still  concealed  several  original 
pieces;  those  which  have  a  political  turn  are  particularly 
good,  for  the  politics  of  Carey  were  those  of  a  poet  and 
a  patriot.  I  refer  the  politician  who  has  any  taste  for 
poetry  and  humour  to  "  The  Grumbletonians,  or  the 
Dogs  without  doors,  a  Fable,"  very  instructive  to  those 
grown-up  folks,  "  The  Ins  and  the  Outs."  "  Carey's 
Wish"  is  in  this  class ;  and,  as  the  purity  of  election 
remains  still  among  the  desiderata  of  every  true  Briton, 
a  poem  on  that  subject  by  the  patriotic  author  of  our 
national  hymn  of  "  God  save  the  King"  may  be  ac- 
ceptable. 

*  The  late  Richard  Clark,  of  the  Chapel  Royal  and  Westminster 
Abbey,  published  in  1823  "An  Account  of  the  National  Anthem,  en- 
titled God  save  the  King,"  in  which  he  satisfactorily  proves  "that 
Carey  neither  had,  nor  could  have  had,  any  claim  at  all  to  this  com- 
position," which  he  traces  back  to  the  celebrated  composer,  Dr.  John 
Bull,  who  he  believes  composed  it  for  the  entertainment  given  by  the 
Merchant  Taylors  Company  to  King  James  I.,  in  1007.  Ward,  in  his 
"Lives  of  the  GresLam  Professors,"  gives  a  list  of  Bull's  compositions, 
then  in  the  possession  of  Dr.  Pepusch  (who  arranged  the  music  for 
the  Beggar's  Opera),  and  Art.  56  is  "God  save  the  King."  At  the 
Doctor's  death,  his  manuscripts,  amounting  to  two  cartloads,  were 
Bcattered  or  sold  for  waste-paper,  and  this  was  one  of  the  number. 
Clark  ultimately  recovered  this  MS. — Ed. 


158  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

caret's  wish. 

Cursed  be  the  wretch  that's  bought  and  sold, 
And  barters  liberty  for  gold ; 
For  when  election  is  not  free, 
In  vain  we  boast  of  liberty : 
And  he  who  sells  his  siDgle  right, 
"Would  sell  his  country,  if  he  might. 

When  liberty  is  put  to  sale 
For  wine,  for  money,  or  for  ale, 
The  sellers  must  be  abject  slaves, 
The  buyers  vile  designing  knaves; 
A  proverb  it  has  been  of  old, 
The  devil's  bought  but  to  be  sold. 

This  maxim  in  the  statesman's  school 
Is  always  taught,  divide  and  ride. 
All  parties  are  to  him  a  joke : 
While  zealots  foam,  he  fits  the  yoke. 
Let  men  their  reason  once  resume; 
'Tis  then  the  statesman's  turn  to  fume. 

I  earn,  learn,  ye  Britons,  to  unite ; 
Leave  off  the  old  exploded  bite ; 
Henceforth  let  Whig  and  Tory  cease, 
And  turn  all  party  rage  to  peace ; 
Rouse  and  revive  your  ancient  glory; 
Unite,  and  drive  the  world  before  you. 

To  the  ballad  of  "Sally  in  our  Alley"  Carey  has 
prefixed  an  argument  so  full  of  nature,  that  the  song 
may  hereafter  derive  an  additional  interest  from  its 
simple  origin.  The  author  assures  the  reader  that  the 
popular  notion  that  the  subject  of  his  ballad  had  been 
the  noted  Sally  Salisbury,  is  perfectly  erroneous,  he 
being  a  stranger  to  her  name  at  the  time  the  song  was 
composed. 

"As  innocence  and  virtue  were  ever  the  boundaries 
of  hi.-  Muse,  so  in  this  little  poem  lie  had  no  other  view 


THE   DESPAIR   OF  YOUNG   POETS.  159 

than  to  set  forth  the  beauty  of  a  chaste  and  disinterested 

passion,  even  in  the  lowest  class  of  human  life.     The 

real  occasion  was  this :  A  shoemaker's  'prentice,  making 

holiday  with  his  sweetheart,  treated  her  with  a  sight  of 

Bedlam,  the  puppet-shows,  the  flying-chairs,  and  all  the 

elegancies    of  Moorfields  ;  from  whence,  proceeding  to 

the  Farthing  Pye-house,  he  gave  her  a  collation  of  buns, 

cheesecakes,  gammon  of  bacon,  stuffed  beef,  and  bottled 

ale ;  through  all  which  scenes  the  author  dodged  them 

(charmed  with  the  simplicity  of  their  courtship),  from 

whence  he  drew  this  little  sketch  of  Nature ;  but,  being 

then  young  and  obscure,  he  was  very  much  ridiculed  for 

this    performance;    which,  nevertheless,  made   its    way 

into  the  polite  world,  and  amply  recompensed  him  by 

the  applause  of  the  divine  Addison,  who  was  pleased 

(more  than  once)  to  mention  it  with  approbation." 

In  "The  Poet's  Resentment "  poor  Carey  had   onco 

forsworn  "  the  harlot  Muse  :" — 

Far,  far  away  then  chase  the  harlot  Muse, 

Nor  let  her  thus  thy  noon  of  life  abuse ; 

Mix  with  the  common  crowd,  unheard,  unseen, 

And  if  again  thou  tempt'st  the  vulgar  praise, 

Mayst  thou  be  crown'd  with  birch  instead  of  bays! 

!     Poets  make  such  oaths  in  sincerity,  and  break  them  in 
rapture. 

At  the  time  that  this  poet  could  neither  walk  the 
streets  nor  be  seated  at  the  convivial  board,  without 
listening  to  his  own  songs  and  his  own  music — for,  in 
truth,  the  whole  nation  was  echoing  his  verse,  and 
crowded  theatres  were  applauding  his  wit  and  humour — ■ 
while   this   very   man   himself,   urged    by    his    strong 


IQQ  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

humanity,  founded  a  "  Fund  for  decayed  Musicians  " — 
he  was  so  broken-hearted,  and  his  own  common  comforts 
so  utterly  neglected,  that  in  despair,  not  waiting  for 
nature  to  relieve  him  from  the  burden  of  existence,  he 
laid  violent  hands  on  himself;  and  when  found  dead, 
had  only  a  halfpenny  in  his  pocket  !  Such  was  the  fate 
of  the  author  of  some  of  the  most  popular  pieces  in  our 
language.  He  left  a  son,  who  inherited  his  misery,  and 
a  urleam  of  his  senilis. 


THE  MISERIES  OF  THE   FIRST  ENGLISH  COM- 
MENTATOR. 

T^R  ZACHARY  GREY,  the  editor  of  "  Hudibras," 
-*-^  is  the  father  of  our  modern  commentators.*  His 
case  is  rather  peculiar ;  I  know  not  whether  the  father, 
by  an  odd  anticipation,  was  doomed  to  suffer  for  the 
sins  of  his  children,  or  whether  his  own  have  been 
visited  on  the  third  generation  ;  it  is  certain  that  never 
was  an  author  more  overpowered  by  the  attacks  he 
received  from  the  light  and  indiscriminating  shafts  of 
ignorant  wits.  He  was  ridiculed  and  abused  for  having 
assisted  us  to  comprehend  the  wit  of  an  author,  which, 
without  that  aid,   at  this  day  would  have  been  nearly 

*  Dr.  Zachary  Grey  was  throughout  a  long  life  a  busy  contributor 
to  literature.  The  mere  list  of  his  productions,  in  divinity  and  history, 
occupy  some  pages  of  our  biographical  dictionaries.  He  was  born 
1G87,  and  died  at  Ampthill,  in  Bedfordshire,  in  17G'J.  In  private  ho 
was  noted  for  mild  and  pleasing  manners.  His  "Hudibras,"  which 
•was  first  published  in  1744,  in  two  octavo  volumes,  is  now  the  stand- 
ard edition. — Ed. 


MISERIES   OE   AN    ENGLISH    COMMENTATOR.       161 

lost  to  us ;  and  whose  singular  subject  involved  persons 
and  events  which  required  the  very  thing  he  gave, — ■ 
historical  and  explanatory  notes. 

A  first  thought,  and  all  the  danger  of  an  original 
invention,  which  is  always  imperfectly  understood  by 
the  superficial,  was  poor  Dr.  Grey's  merit.  He  was 
modest  and  laboi'ious,  and  he  had  the  sagacity  to 
discover  what  Butler  wanted,  and  what  the  public 
required.  His  project  was  a  happy  thought,  to  com- 
mentate on  a  singular  work  which  has  scarcely  a 
parallel  in  modern  literature,  if  we  except  the  "  Satyre 
Menippee  "  of  the  French,  which  is,  in  prose,  the  exact 
counterpart  of  "Hudibras"  in  rhyme;  for  our  rivals 
have  had  the  same  state  revolution,  in  which  the  same 
dramatic  personages  passed  over  their  national  stage, 
with  the  same  incidents,  in  the  civil  wars  of  the  ambitious 
Guises,  and  the  citizen-reformers.  They,  too,  found  a 
Butler,  though  in  prose,  a  Grey  in  Duchat,  and,  as 
well  as  they  could,  a  Hogarth.  An  edition,  which 
appeared  in  1711,  might  have  served  as  the  model  of 
Grey's  Hudibras. 

It  was,  however,  a  happy  thought  in  our  commentator, 

to  turn   over  the   contemporary  writers  to  collect  the 

events  and  discover  the  personages  alluded  to  by  Butler ; 

to  read  what  the  poet  read,  to  observe  what  the  poet 

observed.     This  was  at  once  throwing  himself  and  the 

reader  back  into  an  age,  of  which  even  the  likeness  had 

disappeared,  and  familiarising  us  with  distant  objects, 

which  had  been  lost  to  us  in  the  haze  and  mists  of  time. 

For  this,  not  only  a  new  mode  of  travelling,  but  a  new 
ll 


1G2  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

road  was  to  be  opened;  the  secret  history,  the  fugitive 
pamphlet,  the  obsolete  satire,  the  ancient  comedy — such 
were  the  many  curious  volumes  whose  dust  was  to  be 
cleared  away,  to  cast  a  new  radiance  on  the  fading 
colours  of  a  moveable  picture  of  manners;  the  wittiest 
ever  exhibited  to  mankind.  This  new  mode  of  research, 
even  at  this  moment,  is  imperfectly  comprehended,  still 
ridiculed  even  by  those  who  could  never  have  under- 
stood a  writer  who  will  only  be  immortal  in  the  degree 
he  is  comprehended — and  whose  wit  could  not  have  been 
felt  but  for  the  laborious  curiosity  of  him  whose  "  read- 
ing" has  been  too  often  aspersed  for  "such  reading" 

As  was  never  read. 

Grey  was  outrageously  attacked  by  all  the  wits,  first 
by  Warburton,  in  his  preface  to  Shakspeare,  who  declares 
that  "he  hardly  thinks  there  ever  appeared  so  execrable 
a  heap  of  nonsense  under  the  name  of  commentaries,  as 
hath  been  lately  given  us  on  a  certain  satyric  poet  of  the 
last  age."  It  is  odd  enough,  Warburton  had  himself 
contributed  towards  these  very  notes,  but,  for  some 
'uuse  which  has  not  been  discovered,  had  quarrelled 
with  Dr.  Grey.  I  will  venture  a  conjecture  on  this 
great  conjectural  critic.  Warburton  was  always  medi- 
tating to  give  an  edition  of  his  own  of  our  old  writers, 
and  the  sins  he  committed  against  Shakspeare  he  longed 
to  practise  on  Butler,  whose  times  were,  indeed,  a  favour- 
ite period  of  his  researches.  Grey  had  anticipated  him, 
and  though  Warburtoo  had  half  reluctantly  yielded  the 
i'cw  notes  he  had  prepared,  his  proud  heart  sickened  when 


MISERIES    OF    AN    ENGLISH    COMMENTATOR.      103 

he  "beheld  the  amazing  subscription  Grey  obtained  for 
his  first  edition  of  "  Hudibras ;"  he  received  for  that 
work  15001* — a  proof  that  this  publication  was  felt  as 
a  want  by  the  public. 

Such,  however,  is  one  of  those  blunt,  dogmatic  censures 
in  which  "Warburton  abounds,  to  impress  his  readers 
with  the  weight  of  bis  opinions;  this  great  man  wrote 
more  for  effect  than  any  other  of  our  authors,  as  appears 
by  his  own  or  some  friend's  confession,  that  if  his  edition 
of  Shakspeare  did  no  honour  to  that  bard,  this  was  not 
the  design  of  the  commentator — which  was  only  to  do 
honour  to  himself  by  a  display  of  his  own  exuberant 
erudition. 

The  poignant  Fielding,  in  his  preface  to  his  "  Journey 
to  Lisbon,"  has  a  fling  at  the  gravity  of  our  doctor. 
"  The  laborious,  much-read  Dr.  Z.  Grey,  of  whose 
redundant  notes  on  '  Hudibras'  I  shall  only  say  that  it 
is,  I  am  confident,  the  single  book  extant  in  which  above 
500  authors  are  quoted,  not  one  of  which  could  be  found 
in  the  collection  of  the  late  Dr.  Mead."  Mrs.  Montague, 
in  her  letters,  severely  characterises  the  miserable  father 
of  English  commentators;  she  wrote  in  youth  and 
spirits,  with  no  knowledge  of  books,  and  before  even  the 
unlucky  commentator  had  published  his  work,  but  wit  is 
the  bolder  by  anticipation.  She  observes  that  "  his  dul- 
ness  may  be  a  proper  ballast  for  doggrel ;  and  it  is  better 
that  his  stupidity  should  make  jest  dull  than  serious  and 
sacred  things  ridiculous ;"  alluding  to  his  numerous 
theological  tracts. 

*  Cole's  MSS. 


164  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

Such  then  are  the  hard  returns  which  some  authors 
are  doomed  to  receive  as  the  rewards  of  useful  labours 
from  those  who  do  not  even  comprehend  their  nature ;  a 
wit  should  not  be  admitted  as  a  critic  till  he  has  first 
proved  by  his  gravity,  or  his  dulness  if  he  chooses,  that 
he  has  some  knowledge;  for  it  is  the  privilege  and 
nature  of  wit  to  write  fastest  and  best  on  what  it  least 
understands.  Knowledge  only  encumbers  and  confines 
its  flights. 


THE   LIFE  OF  AN  AUTHORESS. 

/"~\F  all  the  sorrows  in  which  the  female  character  may 
^^  participate,  there  are  few  more  affecting  than  those 
of  an  authoress  ; — often  insulated  and  unprotected  in 
society — with  all  the  sensibility  of  the  sex,  encountering 
miseries  which  break  the  spirits  of  men;  with  the  repug- 
nance arising  from  that  delicacy  which  trembles  when  it 
quits  its  retirement. 

JVIy  acquaintance  with  an  unfortunate  lady  of  the 
name  of  Eliza  Ryves,  was  casual  and  interrupted;  yet  1 
witnessed  the  bitterness  of  "  hope  deferred,  which  ma- 
keth  the  heart  sick."  She  sunk,  by  the  slow  wastings  of 
grief,  into  a  grave  which  probably  does  not  record  the 
name  of  its  martyr  of  literature. 

She  was  descended  from  a  family  of  distinction  in  Ire- 
land ;  but  as  she  expressed  it,  "she  had  been  deprived 
of  her  birthright  by  the  chicanery  of  law."  In  her  for- 
mer hours  of  tranquillity  she  had  published  some  elegant 
odes,   had    written   a   tragedy  and   comedies — all  which 


THE    LIFE    OF    AN    AUTHORESS.  165 

remained  in  MS.  In  her  distress  she  looked  up  to  her 
pen  as  a  source  of  existence  ;  and  an  elegant  genius  and 
a  woman  of  polished  manners  commenced  the  life  of  a 
female  trader  in  literature. 

Conceive  the  repulses  of  a  modest  and  delicate  woman 
in  her  attempts  to  appreciate  the  value  of  a  manuscript 
with  its  purchaser.  She  has  frequently  returned  from 
the  booksellers  to  her  dreadful  solitude  to  hasten  to  her 
bed — in  all  the  bodily  pains  of  misery,  she  has  sought  in 
uneasy  slumbers  a  temporary  forgetfulness  of  griefs 
which  were  to  recur  on  the  morrow.  Elegant  literature 
is  always  of  doubtful  acceptance  with  the  public,  and 
Eliza  Ryves  came  at  length  to  try  the  most  masculine 
exertions  of  the  pen.  She  wrote  for  one  newspaper 
much  political  matter ;  but  the  proprietor  was  too  great 
a  politician  for  the  writer  of  politics,  for  he  only  praised 
the  labour  he  never  paid  ;  much  poetry  for  another,  in 
which,  being  one  of  the  correspondents  of  Delia  Crusca, 
in  payment  of  her  verses  she  got  nothing  but  verses  ; 
the  most  astonishing  exertion  for  a  female  pen  was  the 
entire  composition  of  the  historical  and  political  poi'tion 
of  some  Annual  Register.  So  little  profitable  were  all 
these  laborious  and  original  efforts,  that  every  day  did 
not  bring  its  "  daily  bread."  Yet  even  in  her  poverty 
her  native  benevolence  could  make  her  generous  ;  for 
she  has  deprived  herself  of  her  meal  to  provide  with  one 
an  unhappy  family  dwelling  under  the  same  roof. 

Advised  to  adopt  the  mode  of  translation,  and  being 
ignorant  of  the  French  language,  she  retired  to  an 
obscure  lodging  at  Islington,  which  she  never  quitted 


106  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

till  she  had  produced  a  good  version  of  Rousseau's 
""  Social  Compact."  Raynal's  "  Letter  to  the  National 
Assembly,"  and  finally  translated  De  la  Croix's  "  Re- 
view of  the  Constitutions  of  the  principal  States  in 
Europe,"  in  two  large  volumes  with  intelligent  notes. 
All  these  works,  so  much  at  variance  with  her  taste,  left 
her  with  her  health  much  broken,  and  a  mind  which 
might  be  said  to  have  nearly  survived  the  body. 

Yet  even  at  a  moment  so  unfavourable,  her  ardent 
spirit  engaged  in  a  translation  of  Froissart.  At  the 
British  Museum  I  have  seen  her  conning  over  the  mag- 
nificent and  voluminous  MS.  of  the  old  chronicler,  and 
by  its  side  Lord  Bemers'  version,  printed  in  the  reign 
of  Henry  VIII.  It  was  evident  that  his  lordship  was 
employed  as  a  spy  on  Froissart,  to  inform  her  of  what 
was  going  forward  in  the  French  camp ;  and  she  soon 
perceived,  for  her  taste  was  delicate,  that  it  required  an 
ancient  lord  and  knight,  with  all  his  antiquity  of  phrase, 
to  break  a  lance  with  the  still  more  ancient  chivalric 
Frenchman.  The  familiar  elegance  of  molern  style 
failed  to  preserve  the  picturesque  touches  and  the  naive 
graces  of  the  chronicler,  who  wrote  as  the  mailed  knight 
combated — roughly  or  gracefully,  as  suited  the  tilt  or 
the  field.  She  vailed  to  Lord  Berners ;  while  she  felt  it 
was  here  necessary  to  understand  old  French,  a*nd  then 
to  write  it  in  old  English.*  During  these  profitless 
labours  hope  seemed  to  be  whispering  In  her  lonely 
study.  Her  comedies  had  been  in  possession  of  the 
managers  of  the  theatres  during  several    years.     They 

*  This  version  of  Lord  Bnrners  has  been  reprinted 


THE    LIFE    OF    AN    AUTHORESS.  107 

had  too  much  merit  to  be  rejected,  perhaps  too  little  to 
be  acted.  Year  passed  over  year,  and  the  last  still  re- 
peated the  treacherous  promise  of  its  brother.  The 
mysterious  arts  of  procrastination  are  by  no  one  so  well 
systematised  as  by  the  theatrical  manager,  nor  its  secret 
sorrows  so  deeply  felt  as  by  the  dramatist.  One  of  her 
comedies,  The  Debt  of  Honour,  had  been  warmly  ap- 
proved at  both  theatres — where  probably  a  cop}'  of  it 
may  still  be  found.  To  the  honour  of  one  of  the 
managers,  he  presented  her  with  a  hundred  pounds  on 
his  acceptance  of  it.  Could  she  avoid  then  flattering 
herself  with  an  annual  harvest  ? 

But  even  this  generous  gift,  which  involved  in  it  such 
golden  promises,  could  not  for  ten  years  preserve  its 
delusion.  "  I  feel,"  said  Eliza  Ry ves,  "  the  necessity  of 
some  powerful  patronage,  to  bring  my  comedies  forward 
to  the  world  with  eclat,  and  secure  them  an  admiration 
which,  should  it  even  be  deserved,  is  seldom  bestowed, 
unless  some  leading  judge  of  literary  merit  gives  the 
sanction  of  his  applause  ;  and  then  the  world  will  chime 
in  with  his  opinion,  without  taking  the  trouble  to  inform 
themselves  whether  it  be  founded  in  justice  or  parti- 
ality." She  never  suspected  that  her  comedies  were 
not  comic  ! — but  who  dare  hold  an  argument  with  an 
ingenious  mind,  when  it  reasons  from  a  right  principle, 
with  a  wrong  application  to  itself?  It  is  true  that  a 
writer's  connexions  have  often  done  a  great  deal  for  a 
small  author,  and  enabled  some  favourites  of  literary 
fashion  to  enjoy  a  usurped  reputation;  but  it  is  not  so 
evident   that  Eliza  Kyves  was  a  comic  writer,  although, 


108  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

doubtless,  she  appeared  another  Menander  to  herself. 
And  thus  an  author  dies  in  a  delusion  of  self-flattery  ! 

The  character  of  Eliza  Ryves  was  rather  tender  and 
melancholy,  than  brilliant  and  gay ;  and  like  the  bruised 
perfume — breathing  sweetness  when  broken  into  pieces. 
She  traced  her  sorrows  in  a  work  of  fancy,  where  her 
feelings  were  at  least  as  active  as  her  imagination.  It 
is  a  small  volume,  entitled  "  The  Hermit  of  Snowden." 
Albert,  opulent  and  fashionable,  feels  a  passion  for  Lavi- 
nia,  and  meets  the  kindest  return  ;  but,  having  imbibed 
an  ill  opinion  of  women  from  his  licentious  connexions, 
he  conceived  they  were  slaves  of  passion,  or  of  avarice. 
He  wrongs  the  generous  nature  of  Lavinia,  by  suspect- 
ing her  of  mercenary  views  ;  hence  arise  the  perplexities 
of  the  hearts  of  both.  Albert  affects  to  be  ruined,  and 
spreads  the  report  of  an  advantageous  match.  Lavinia 
feels  all  the  delicacy  of  her  situation  ;  she  loves,  but  "  she 
never  told  her  love."  She  seeks  for  her  existence  in  her 
literary  labours,  and  perishes  in  want. 

In  the  character  of  Lavinia,  our  authoress,  with  all  the 
melancholy  sagacity  of  genius,  foresaw  and  lias  described 
her  own  death  ! — the  dreadful  solitude  to  which  she  was 
latterly  condemned,  when  in  the  last  stage  of  her  poverty ; 
her  frugal  mode  of  life ;  her  acute  sensibility  ;  her  de- 
frauded hopes  ;  and  her  exalted  fortitude.  She  has  here 
formed  a  register  of  all  that  occurred  in  her  solitary  ex- 
istence. I  will  give  one  scene — to  me  it  is  pathetic — for 
it  is  like  a  scene  at  which  I  was  j. resent : — 

"  Lavinia's  lodgings  were  about  two  miles  from  town, 
in  an  obscure  situation.     I  was  showed  up  to  a  mean 


THE    LIFE    OF   AN   AUTHORESS.  169 

apart  aent,  where  Lavinia  was  sitting  at  work,  and  in 
a  dress  which  indicated  the  greatest  economy.  I  in- 
quired what  success  she  had  met  with  in  her  dramatic 
pursuits.  She  waved  her  head,  and,  with  a  melancholy 
smile,  replied,  '  that  her  hopes  of  ever  bringing  any  piece 
on  the  stage  were  now  entirely  over ;  for  she  found  that 
more  interest  was  necessary  for  the  purpose  than  she 
could  command,  and  that  she  had  for  that  reason  laid 
aside  her  comedy  for  ever !'  While  she  was  talking, 
came  in  a  favourite  dog  of  Lavinia's,  which  I  had  used 
to  caress.  The  creature  sprang  to  my  arms,  and  I  re- 
ceived him  with  my  usual  fondness.  Lavinia  endeavoured 
to  conceal  a  tear  which  trickled  down  her  cheek.  After- 
wards she  said,  '  Now  that  I  live  entirely  alone,  I  show 
Juno  more  attention  than  I  had  used  to  do  formerly. 
The  heart  wants  something  to  be  kind  to;  and  it  consoles 
us  for  the  loss  of  society,  to  see  even  an  animal  derive 
happiness  from  the  endearments  we  bestow  upon  it.' " 

Such  was  Eliza  Ryves  !  not  beautiful  nor  interesting 
in  her  person,  but  with  a  mind  of  fortitude,  susceptible 
of  all  the  delicacy  of  feminine  softness,  and  virtuous  amid 
her  despair.* 

*  Those  who  desire  to  further  investigate  the  utter  misery  of  female 
authorship  may  be  referred  to  "Whyte's  vivid  description  of  an  inter- 
view with  Mrs.  Clarke  (the  daughter  of  Colley  (Jibber),  about  the  pur- 
chase of  a  novel.  It  is  appended  to  an  edition  of  his  own  poems, 
printe  I  at  Dublin,  1792;  and  has  been  reproduced  in  Hone's  '"Table 
Bock,"  vol.  i.— Ed. 


170  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 


THE  INDISCRETION   OF   AX   HISTORIAN 

THOMAS    CARTE. 

"/"^ARTE,"  says  Mr.  Hallam,  "is  the  most  exact  histo- 
^-^rian  we  have;"  and  Dailies  Barrington  prefers  his 
authority  to  that  of  any  other,  and  many  other  writers 
confirm  this  opinion.  Yet  had  this  historian  been  an 
ordinary  compiler,  he  could  not  have  incurred  a  more 
mortifying  fate ;  for  he  was  compelled  to  retail  in  shil- 
ling numbers  that  invaluable  history  which  we  have  only 
learned  of  late  times  to  appreciate,  and  which  was  the 
laborious  fruits  of  self-devotion. 

Carte  was  the  first  of  our  historians  who  had  the 
sagacity  and  the  fortitude  to  ascertain  where  the  true 
sources  of  our  history  lie.  He  discovered  a  new  world 
beyond  the  old  one  of  our  research,  and  not  satisfied 
in  gleaning  the  res  historica  from  its  original  writers — a 
merit  which  has  not  always  been  possessed  by  some  of 
our  popular  historians— Carte  opened  those  subterrane- 
ous veins  of  secret  history  from  whence  even  the  original 
writers  of  our  history,  had  they  possessed  them,  might 
have  drawn  fresh  knowledge  and  more  ample  views. 
Our  domestic  or  civil  history  was  scarcely  attempted  till 
Carte  planned  it;  while  all  his  laborious  days  and  his 
literary  travels  on  the  Continent  were  absorbed  in  the 
creation  of  a  History  of  England  and  of  a  Public  Li- 
brary  in  the  metropolis,  for  we  possessed  neither.  A 
diligent  foreigner,  Rapin,  had  compiled  our  history,  and 


THE   INDISCRETION   OF   AN  HISTORIAN.  171 

•had  opportunely  found  in  the  vast  collection  of  Rymer's 
"Fcedera"a  rich  accession  of  knowledge;  but  a  foreigner 
could  not  sympathise  with  the  feelings,  or  even  under- 
stand the  language,  of  the  domestic  story  of  our  nation; 
our  rolls  and  records,  our  state-letters,  the  journals  of 
parliament,  and  those  of  the  privy-council ;  an  abundant 
source  of  private  memoirs ;  and  the  hidden  treasures  in 
the  state-paper  office,  the  Cottonian  and  Harleian  libra- 
ries; all  these,  and  much  besides,  the  sagacity  of  Carte 
contemplated.  He  had  further  been  taught — by  his 
own  examination  of  the  true  documents  of  history,  which 
he  found  preserved  among  the  ancient  families  of  France, 
who  with  a  warm  patriotic  spirit,  worthy  of  imitation, 
"  often  carefully  preserved  in  their  families  the  acts  of 
their  ancestors ;"  and  the  tresor  des  chartes  and  the  depdt 
pour  les  affaires  etrang^res  (the  state-paper  office  of 
France), — that  the  history  of  our  country  is  interwoven 
with  that  of  its  neighbours,  as  well  as  with  that  of  our 
own  countrymen.* 

Carte,  with  these  enlarged  views,  and  firm  with 
diligence  which  never  paused,  was  aware  that  such 
labours — both  for  the  expense  and  assistance  they 
demand — exceeded  the  powers  of  a  private  individual ; 
but  "  what  a  single  man  cannot  do,"  he  said,  "  may  be 
easily  done  by  a  society,  and  the  value  of  an  opera 
subscription  would  be  sufficient  to  patronise  a  History 
of  England."     His  valuable  "  History  of  the  Duke  of 

*  It  is  much  to  tho  honour  of  Carte,  that  the  French  acknowledge 
that  his  publication  of  the  "  Rolles  G-ascognes"  gave  to  them  the 
first  idea  of  their  learned  work,  the  ''Notice  de3  Diolouies  " 


172  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

Ormond"  had  sufficiently  announced  the  sort  of  man 
who  solicited  this  necessary  aid;  nor  was  the  moment 
unpropitious  to  his  fondest  hopes,  for  a  Society  for  the 
Encouragement  of  Learning  had  been  formed,  and 
this  impulse  of  public  spirit,  however  weak,  had,  it 
would  seem,  roused  into  action  some  unexpected 
quarters.  "When  Carte's  project  was  made  known,  a 
large  subscription  was  raised  to  defray  the  expense 
of  transcripts,  and  afford  a  sufficient  independence  to 
the  historian;  many  of  the  nobility  and  the  gentry 
subscribed  ten  or  twenty  guineas  annually,  and  several 
of  the  corporate  bodies  in  the  city  honourably  appeared 
as  the  public  patrons  of  the  literature  of  their  nation. 
He  had,  perhaps,  nearly  a  thousand  a  year  subscribed, 
which  he  employed  on  the  History.  Thus  everything 
promised  fair  both  for  the  history  and  for  the  historian 
of  our  fatherland,  and  about  this  time  he  zealously 
published  another  proposal  for  the  erection  of  a  public 
library  in  the  Mansion-house.  "There  is  not,"  observed 
Carte,  "a  great  city  in  Europe  so  ill-provided  with 
public  libraries  as  London."  He  enters  into  a  very 
interesting  and  minute  narrative  of  the  public  libraries 
of  Paris.*  He  then  also  suggested  the  purchase  of  ten 
thousand  manuscripts  of  the  Earl  of  Oxford,  which  tht> 
nation  now  possess  in  the  Harleian  collection. 

Though  Carte  failed  to  persuade  our  opulent  citizens 
to  purchase  this  costly  honour,  it  is  probably  to  his 
suggestion   that  the  nation  owes  the  British  Museum. 

*  This  paper,  which  is  a  great  literary  curiosity,  is  preserved  by 
Mr.  Nichols  iu  his  "  Literary  History,"  vol.  ii. 


THE   INDISCRETION"   OF   AN  HISTORIAN.  173 

The  ideas  of  the  literary  man  are  never  thrown  away, 
however  vain  at  the  moment,  or  however  profitless  to 
himself.  Time  preserves  without  injuring  the  image  of 
his  mind,  and  a  following  age  often  performs  what  the 
preceding  failed  to  comprehend. 

It  was  in  1743  that  this  work  was  projected,  in  1747 
the  first  volume  appeared.  One  single  act  of  indiscre- 
tion, an  unlucky  accident  rather  than  a  premeditated 
design,  overturned  in  a  moment  this  monument  of 
history  ; — for  it  proved  that  our  Carte,  however  enlarged 
were  his  views  of  what  history  ought  to  consist,  and 
however  experienced  in  collecting  its  most  authentic 
materials,  and  accurate  in  their  statement,  was  infected 
by  a  superstitious  jacobitism,  which  seemed  likely  to 
spread  itself  through  his  extensive  history.  Carte 
indeed  was  no  philosopher,  but  a  very  faithful  historian. 

Having  unhappily  occasion  to  discuss  whether  the 
King  of  England  had,  from  the  time  of  Edward  the 
Confessor,  the  power  of  healing  inherent  in  him  before 
his  unction,  or  whether  the  gift  was  conveyed  by  eccle- 
siastical hands,  to  show  the  efficacy  of  the  royal  touch, 
he  added  an  idle  story,  which  had  come  under  his  own 
observation,  of  a  person  who  appeared  to  have  been  so 
healed.  Carte  said  of  this  unlucky  personage,  so  un- 
worthily introduced  five  hundred  years  before  he  was 
born,  that  he  had  been  sent  to  Paris  to  be  touched  by 
"  the  eldest  lineal  descendant  of  a  race  of  kings  who  had 
indeed  for  a  long  succession  of  ages  cured  that  distemper 
by  the  royal  touch."  The  insinuation  was  unquestion- 
ably in  favour  of  the  Pretender,  although  the  name  of 


174:  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

the  prince  was  not  avowed,  and  was  a  sort  of  promulga- 
tion of  the  right  divine  to  the  English  throne. 

The  first  news  our  author  heard  of  his  elaborate 
history  was  the  discovery  of  this  unforeseen  calamity; 
the  public  indignation  was  roused,  and  subscribers, 
public  and  private,  hastened  to  withdraw  their  names. 
The  historian  was  left  forlorn  and  abandoned  amid  his 
extensive  collections,  and  Truth,  which  was  about  to  be 
drawn  out  of  her  well  by  this  robust  labourer,  was  no 
longer  imagined  to  lie  concealed  at  the  bottom  of  the 
waters. 

Thunderstruck  at  this  dreadful  reverse  to  all  his 
hopes,  and  witnessing  the  unrequited  labour  of  more  than 
thirty  years  withered  in  an  hour,  the  unhappy  Carte 
drew  up  a  faint  appeal ;  rendered  still  more  weak  by  a 
long  and  improbable  tale,  that  the  objectionable  illus- 
tration had  been  merely  a  private  note  which  by  mistake 
had  been  printed,  and  only  designed  to  show  that  the 
person  who  had  been  healed  improperly  attributed  his 
cure  to  the  sanative  virtue  of  the  regal  unction  ;  since 
the  prince  in  question  had  never  been  anointed.  Bnt 
this  was  plunging  from  Scylla  into  Charybdis,  for  it 
inferred  that  the  Stuarts  inherited  the  heavenly-gifted 
touch  by  descent.  This  could  not  avail;  yet  heavy  was 
the  calamity!  for  now  an  historian  of  the  utmost  pro- 
bity and  exactness,  and  whose  labours  were  never 
equalled  for  their  scope  and  extent,  was  ruined  for  an 
absurd  but  not  peculiar  opinion,  and  an  indiscretion 
which  was  more  ludicrous  than  dishonest. 

This  shock  of  public  opinion  was  met  with  a  fortitude 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  175 

which  only  strong  minds  experience ;  Carte  was  the 
true  votary  of  study, — by  habit,  by  devotion,  and  by 
pleasure,  he  persevered  in  producing  an  invaluable  folio 
every  two  years;  but  from  three  thousand  copies  he  was 
reduced  to  seven  hundred  and  fifty,  and  the  obscure 
patronage  of  the  few  who  knew  how  to  appreciate  them. 
Death  only  arrested  the  historian's  pen — in  the  fourth 
volume.  We  have  lost  the  important  period  of  the 
reign  of  the  second  Charles,  of  which  Carte  declared 
that  he  had  read  "  a  series  of  memoirs  from  the  begin- 
ning to  the  end  of  that  reign  which  would  have  laid 
open  all  those  secret  intrigues  which  Burnet  with  all  his 
genius  for  conjecture  does  not  pretend  to  account  for." 

So  precious  were  the  MS.  collections  Carte  left  behind 
him,  that  the  proprietor  valued  them  at  15001.  ;  Philip 
Earl  of  Hardwicke  paid  200/.  only  for  the  perusal,  and 
Macpherson  a  larger  sum  for  their  use;  and  Hume, 
without  Carte,  would  scarcely  have  any  authorities. 
Such  was  the  calamitous  result  of  Carte's  historical 
labours,  who  has  left  others  of  a  more  philosophical 
cast,  and  of  a  finer  taste  in  composition,  to  reap  the 
harvest  whose  soil  had  been  broken  by  his  hand. 


LITERARY  RIDICULE. 

ILLUSTRATED   BY   SOME   ACCOUNT   OF   A  LITERARY   SATIRE. 

T7>IDICULE    may    be    considered    as   a   species    of 
^  eloquence ;  it  has  all  its  vehemence,  all  its  exag- 
geration, all  its  power  of  diminution ;  it  is  irresistible ! 


176  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

Its  business  is  not  with  truth,  but  with  its  appearance ; 
and  it  is  this  similitude,  in  perpetual  comparison  with 
the  original,  which,  raising  contempt,  produces  the 
ridiculous. 

There  is  nothing  real  in  ridicule  ;  the  more  exquisite, 
the  more  it  borrows  from  the  imagination.  When 
directed  towards  an  individual,  by  preserving  a  unity  of 
character  in  all  its  parts,  it  produces  a  fictitious  per- 
sonage, so  modelled  on  the  prototype,  that  we  know  not 
to  distinguish  the  true  one  from  the  false.  Even  with 
an  intimate  knowledge  of  the  real  object,  the  ambiguous 
image  slides  into  our  mind,  for  we  are  at  least  as  much 
influenced  in  our  opinions  by  our  imagination  as  by  our 
judgment.  Hence  some  great  characters  have  come 
down  to  us  spotted  with  the  taints  of  indelible  wit  ;  and 
a  satirist  of  this  class,  sporting  with  distant  resem- 
blances and  fanciful  analogies,  has  made  the  fictitious 
accompany  for  ever  the  real  character.  Piqued  with 
Akenside  for  some  reflections  against  Scotland,  Smollett 
has  exhibited  a  man  of  great  genius  and  virtue  as  a 
most  ludicrous  personage ;  and  who  can  discriminate, 
in  the  ridiculous  physician  in  "  Peregrine  Pickle,"  what 
is  real  from  what  is  fictitious  ?* 

*  Of  Akenside  few  particulars  have  been  recorded,  for  the  friend 
who  best  knew  him  was  of  so  cold  a  temper  with  regard  to  public 
opinion,  that  he  has  not.  in  his  account,  revealed  a  solitary  feature  in 
the  character  of  the  poet.  Yet  Akenside"s  mind  and  manners  were 
of  a  fine  romantic  cast,  drawn  from  the  moulds  of  classical  antiquity. 
Such  was  the  charm  of  his  converse,  that  he  even  heated  the  cold  and 
sluggish  mind  of  Sir  John  Hawkins,  who  has,  with  unusual  vivacity, 
described  a  day  spent  with  him  in  the  country.  As  I  have  mentioned 
the  fictitious  physician  in  "Peregrine  Pickle,"  let  the  same  page  show 


LITERARY   RIDICULE.  177 

The  banterers  and  ridiculers  possess  this  provoking 
advantage  over  sturdy  honesty  or  nervous  sensibility — 
their  amusing  fictions  affect  the  world  more  than  the 
plain  tale  that  would  put  them  down.  They  excite  our 
risible  emotions,  while  they  are  reducing  their  adversary 
to  contempt — otherwise  they  would  not  be  distinguished 
from  gross  slanderers.  When  the  wit  has  gained  over 
the  laughers  on  his  side,  he  has  struck  a  blow  which 
puts  his  adversary  Jwrs  cle  cotnbat.  A  grave  reply  can 
never  wound  ridicule,  which,  assuming  all  forms,  has 
really  none.  Witty  calumny  and  licentious  raillery  are 
airy  nothings  that  float  about  us,  invulnerable  from  their 
very  nature,  like  those  chimeras  of  hell  which  the  sword 
of  iEneas  could  not  pierce — yet  these  shadows  of  truth, 
these  false  images,  these  fictitious  realities,  have  made 
heroism  tremble,  turned  the  eloquence  of  wisdom  into 
folly,  and  bowed  down  the  spirit  of  honour  itself. 

the  real  one.  I  shall  transcribe  Sir  John's  forgotten  words — omitting 
his  "neat  and  elegant  dinner;" — "Akenside*s  conversation  was  of 
the  most  delightful  kind,  learned,  instructive,  and,  without  any  affec- 
tation of  wit,  cheerful  and  entertaining.  One  of  the  pleasantest  days 
of  my  life  I  passed  with  him,  Mr.  Dyson,  and  another  friend,  at 
Putney — where  the  enlivening  sunshine  of  a  summer's  day,  and  the 
view  of  an  unclouded  sky,  were  the  least  of  our  gratifications.  In 
perfect  good-humour  with  himself  and  all  about  him,  he  seemed  to 
fee!  a  joy  that  he  lived,  and  poured  out  his  gratulations  to  the  great 
Dispenser  of  all  felicity  in  expressions  that  Flato  himself  might  have 
uttered  on  such  an  occasion.  In  conversations  with  select  friends,  and 
those  whose  studies  had  been  nearly  the  same  with  his  own,  it  was  a 
usual  thing  with  him,  in  libatioDS  to  the  memory  of  eminent  men 
among  the  ancients,  to  bring  their  characters  into  view,  and  expatiate 
on  those  particulars  of  their  lives  that  had  rendered  them  famous." 
Observe  the  arts  of  the  ridiculerl  he  seized  on  the  romantic  enthusiasm 
of  Akenside,  and  turned  it  to  tfte  cookery  of  the  ancients  I 
12 


178  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

Not  that  the  legitimate  use  of  ridicule  is  denied  :  the 
wisest  men  have  been  some  of  the  most  exquisite  ridi- 
cnlers ;  from  Socrates  to  the  Fathers,  and  from  the 
Fathers  to  Erasmus,  and  from  Erasmus  to  Butler  and 
Swift.  Ridicule  is  more  efficacious  than  argument; 
when  that  keen  instrument  cuts  what  cannot  be  untied. 
"The  Rehearsal"  wrote  down  the  unnatural  taste  for 
the  rhyming  heroic  tragedies,  and  brought  the  nation 
back  from  sound  to  sense,  from  rant  to  passion.  More 
important  events  may  be  traced  in  the  history  of  Ridi- 
cule. When  a  certain  set  of  intemperate  Puritans,  in 
the  reign  of  Elizabeth,  the  ridiculous  reformists  of  abuses 
in  Church  and  State,  congregated  themselves  under  the 
literary  nom  cle  guerre  of  Martin  Mar-prelate,  a  stream 
of  libels  ran  throughout  the  nation.  The  grave  dis- 
courses of  the  archbishop  and  the  prelates  could  never 
silence  the  hardy  and  concealed  libellers.  They  em- 
ployed a  moveable  printing-press,  and  the  publishers 
perpetually  shifting  their  place,  long  escaped  detection. 
They  declared  their  works  were  "  printed  in  Europe,  not 
far  from  some  of  the  bouncing  priests ;"  or  they  were 
"printed  over  sea,  in  Europe,  within  two  furlongs  of  a 
bouncing  priest,  at  the  cost  and  charges  of  Martin  Mar- 
prelate,  gent."  It  was  then  that  Tom  Nash,  whom  I 
am  about  to  introduce  to  the  reader's  more  familiar 
acquaintance,  the  most  exquisite  banterer  of  that  age  of 
genius,  turned  on  them  their  own  weapons,  and  anni- 
hilated them  into  silence  when  they  found  themselves 
paid  in  their  own  base  coin,  lie  rebounded  their  popu- 
lar ribaldry  on  themselves,  with  such   replies  as,   "Pap 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  179 

With  a  hatchet,  or  a  fig  for  my  godson  ;  or,  crack  me 
this  nut.  To  be  sold,  at  the  sign  of  the  Crab-tree 
Cudgel,  in  Thwack-coat  lane."*  Not  less  biting  was 
his  "Almond  for  a  Parrot,  or  an  Alms  for  Martin." 
Nash  first  silenced  Martin  Mar-prelate,  and  the  govern- 
ment afterwards  hanged  him  ;  Nash  might  be  vain  of 
the  greater  honour.  A  ridiculer  then  is  the  best  cham- 
pion to  meet  another  ridiculer;  their  scurrilities  magic- 
ally undo  each  other. 

But  the  abuse  of  ridicule  is  not  one  of  the  least 
calamities  of  literature,  when  it  Avithers  genius,  and 
gibbets  whom  it  ought  to  enshrine.  Never  let  us  forget 
that  Socrates  before  his  judges  asserted  that  "his  perse- 
cution originated  in  the  licensed  raillery  of  Aristophanes, 
which  had  so  unduly  influenced  the  popular  mind  during 
several  years!"  And  thus  a  fictitious  Socrates,  not  the 
great  moralist,  was  condemned.  Armed  with  the  most 
licentious  ridicule,  the  Aretine  of  our  own  country  and 
times  has  proved  that  its  chief  magistrate  was  not  pro- 
tected by  the  shield  of  domestic  and  public  virtues  ;  a 
false  and  distorted  image  of  an  intelligent  monarch 
could  cozen  the  gross  many,  and  aid  the  purposes  of 
the  subtle  few. 

There  is  a  plague-spot  in  ridicule,  and  the  man  who 

*  This  pamphlet  has  been  ascribed  to  John  Lilly,  but  it  must  be 
confessed  that  its  native  vigour  strangely  contrasts  with  the  famous 
Euphuism  of  that  refined  writer.  [There  can,  however,  be  little 
doubt  that  he  was  the  author  of  this  tract,  as  he  is  alluded  to  more 
than  once  as  such  by  Harvey  in  his  "  Pierce's  Supererogation ;  " — 
"would  that  Lilly  had  alvvaies  been  Euphues  and  never  Fap-hatchzt" 
—Ed.] 


180  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

is  touched  with  it  can  be  sent  forth  as  the  jest  of  his 
country. 

The  literary  reign  of  Elizabeth,  so  fertile  in  every 
kind  of  genius,  exhibits  a  remarkable  instance,  in  the 
controversy  between  the  witty  Tom  Nash  and  the 
learned  Gabriel  Harvey.  It  will  illustrate  the  nature 
of  the  fictiom  of  ridicule,  expose  the  materials  of  which 
its  shafts  are  composed,  and  the  secret  arts  by  which 
ridicule  can  level  a  character  which  seems  to  be  placed 
above  it. 

Gabriel  Harvey  was  an  author  of  considerable  rank, 
but  with  two  learned  brothers,  as  "Wood  tells  us,  "  had 
the  ill  luck  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  that  noted  and  rest- 
less buffoon,  Tom  Xash." 

Harvey  is  not  unknown  to  the  lover  of  jooetry,  from 
his  connexion  with  Spenser,  who  loved  and  revered 
him.  He  is  the  Hobynol  whose  poem  is  prefixed  to  the 
"  Faery  Queen,"  who  introduced  Spenser  to  Sir  Philip 
Sidney :  and,  besides  his  intimacy  with  the  literary 
characters  of  his  times,  he  was  a  Doctor  of  Laws,  an 
erudite  scholar,  and  distinguished  as  a  poet.  Such  a 
man  could  hardly  be  contemptible;  and  yet,  when  some 
little  peculiarities  become  aggravated,  and  his  works  are 
touched  by  the  caustic  of  the  most  adroit  banterer  of 
that  age  of  wit,  no  character  has  descended  to  us  with 
such  grotesque  deformity,  exhibited  in  so  ludicrous  an 
attitude. 

Harvey  was  a  pedant,  but  pedantry  was  part  of  the 
erudition  of  an  age  when  our  national  literature  Avas 
passing    from    its    infancy;    he   introduced    hexameter 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  Igl 

verses  into  our  language,  and  pompously  laid  claim  to 
an  invention  which,  designed  for  the  reformation  of 
English  verse,  was  practised  till  it  was  found  sufficiently 
ridiculous.  His  style  was  infected  with  his  pedantic 
taste ;  and  the  hard  outline  of  his  satirical  humour 
betrays  the  scholastic  cynic,  not  the  airy  and  fluent 
wit.  He  had,  perhaps,  the  foibles  of  a  man  who  was 
cleai'ing  himself  from  obscurity ;  he  prided  himself  on 
his  family  alliances,  while  he  fastidiously  looked  askance 
on  the  trade  of  his  father — a  rope-manufacturer. 

He  was  somewhat  rich  in  his  apparel,  according  to 
the  rank  in  society  he  held ;  and,  hungering  after  the 
notice  of  his  friends,  they  fed  him  on  soft  sonnet  and 
relishing  dedication,  till  Harvey  ventured  to  publish 
a  collection  of  panegyrics  on  himself — and  thus  gravely 
stepped  into  a  niche  erected  to  Vanity.  At  length  he 
and  his  two  brothers — one  a  divine  and  the  other  a 
physician  —  became  students  of  astronomy;  then  an 
astronomer  usually  ended  in  an  almanac-maker,  and 
above  all,  in  an  astrologer — an  avocation  which  tempted 
a  man  to  become  a  prophet.  Their  "  sharp  and  learned 
judgment  on  earthquakes"  drove  the  people  out  of 
their  senses  (says  Wood) ;  but  when  nothing  happened 
of  their  predictions,  the  brothers  received  a  severe 
castigation  from  those  great  enemies  of  prophets,  the 
wits.  The  buffoon,  Tarleton,  celebrated  for  his  extem- 
pore humour,  jested  on  them  at  the  theatre;*  Elderton, 

*  Tarleton  appears  to  have  had  considerable  power  of  extemporising 
satirical  rhymes  on  the  fleeting  events  of  his  own  day.  A  collection 
of  his  Jests  was  published  in  1611;  the  following  is  a  favourable 


132  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

a  drunken  ballad -maker,  "consumed  his  ale-crammed 
nose  to  nothing  in  bear-bating  them  with  bundles  of 
ballads."*  One  on  the  earthquake  commenced  with 
"  Quake  !  quake  !  quake  ! "  They  made  the  people  laugh 
at  their  false  terrors,  or,  as  Xash  humorously  describes 
their  fanciful  panic,  "  when  they  sweated  and  were  not  a 
haire  the  worse."  Thus  were  the  three  learned  brothers 
beset  by  all  the  town-wits  ;  Gabriel  had  the  hardihood, 
with  all  undue  gravity,  to  charge  pell-mell  among  the 
whole  knighthood  of  drollery  ;  a  circumstance  probably 
alluded  to  by  Spenser,  in  a  sonnet  addressed  to  Harvey — 

"  Harvey,  the  happy  above  happier  men, 
I  read ;  that  sitting  like  a  looker-on 
Of  this  worlde's  stage,  dost  note  with  critique  pen 
The  sharp  dislikes  of  each  condition ; 
And,  as  one  carelesse  of  su^pition, 
Ne  fawnest  for  the  favour  of  the  great ; 
Ke  fenrest  foolish  reprehension 
Of  faulty  men,  which  daungtr  to  thee  threat, 
But  freely  doest  of  what  thee  list,  entreat, 
Like  a  great  lord  of  peerlesse  liberty. — " 

The  "  foolish  reprehension  of  faulty  men,  threatening 
Harvey  with  danger,"  describes  that  gregarious  herd  of 

specimen: — "There  was  a  nobleman  asked  Tarleton  what  he  thought 
of  soldiers  in  time  of  peace.  Marry,  quoth  he,  they  are  like  chimneys 
in  summer." — Ed. 

*  A  long  list  of  Elderton's  popular  rhymes  is  given  by  Ritson  in 
his  "Bibliographia  Poetica."  One  of  them,  on  the  "King  of  Scots 
and  Andrew  Browne,"  is  published  in  Percy's  "  Reliques,"  who  speak3 
of  him  as  "a  facetious  fuddling  companion,  whose  tippling  and  whose 
rhymes  rendered  him  famous  among  his  contemporaries."  Ritson  is 
more  condensed  and  less  civil  in  his  analysis ;  he  simply  describes 
him  as  "  a  ballad-maker  by  profession,  and  a  drunkard  by  habit." — 
Ed. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  183 

town-wits  in  the  age  of  Elizabeth — Kit  Marlow,  Robert 
Greene,  Dekker,  Xash,  &c. — men  of  no  moral  principle, 
of  high  passions,  and  the  most  pregnant  Lucianic  wits 
who  ever  flourished  at  one  period.*  Unfortunately  for 
the  learned  Harvey,  his  "critique  pen,"  which  is  strange 
in  so  polished  a  mind  and  so  curious  a  student,  indulged 
a  sharpness  of  invective  which  would  have  been  peculiar 
to  himself, h:nl  his  adversary,  Xash,  not  quite  outdone  him. 
Their  pamphlets  foamed  against  each  other,  till  Xash,  in 
his  vehement  invective,  involved  the  whole  generation  of 
the  Harveys,  made  one  brother  more  ridiculous  than  the 
other,  and  even  attainted  the  fair  name  of  Gabriel's  re- 
spectable sister.  Gabriel,  indeed,  after  the  death  of 
Robert  Greene,  the  crony  of  Xash,  sitting  like  a  vampyre 
on  his  grave,  sucked  blood  from  his  corpse,  in  a  memora- 
ble narrative  of  the  debaucheries  and  miseries  of  this 
town-wit.  I  throw  into  the  note  the  most  awful  satirical 
address  I  ever  read.f     It  became  necessary  to  dry  up  the 

*  Harvey,  in  the  titlepage  of  his  "  Pierce's  Supererogation,"  has 
placed  an  emblematic  woodcut,  expressive  of  his  own  confidence,  and 
his  contempt  of  the  wits.  It  is  a  lofty  palm-tree,  with  its  durable  and 
impenetrable  trunk;  at  its  feet  he  a  heap  of  serpents,  darting  their 
tongues,  and  filthy  toads,  in  vain  attempting  to  pierce  or  to  pollute  it. 
The  Italian  motto,  wreathed  among  the  branches  of  the  palm,  declares, 
11  vo-tro  ntaliynare  non  giova  nulla :  Your  malignity  avails  nothing. 

f  Among  those  Sonnets,  in  Harvey's  "Foure  Letters,  and  certaine 
Sonnets,  especially  touching  Robert  Greene  and  other  parties  by  him 
abused,  1592,"  there  is  one,  which,  with  great  originality  of  concep- 
tion, has  an  equal  vigour  of  style,  and  causticity  of  satire,  on  Robert 
Greene's  death.  John  Harvey  the  physician,  who  was  then  dead,  is 
thus  made  to  address  the  town-wit,  and  the  libeller  of  himself  and  his 
family.  If  Gabriel  was  the  writer  of  this  singular  Sonnet,  as  he  un- 
doubtedly is  of  the  verses  to  Spenser,  subscribed  Hobynol,  it  must  be 


184  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

floodgates  of  these  rival  ink-horns,  by  an  order  of  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  The  order  is  a  remarkable 
fragment  of  our  literary  history,  and  is  thus  expressed  : — 
"That  all  Xashe's  bookes  and  Dr.  Harvey's  bookes  be 
taken  wheresoever  they  may  be  found,  and  that  none  of 
the  said  bookes  be  ever  printed  hereafter." 

This  extraordinary  circumstance  accounts  for  the  ex- 
cessive rarity  of  Harvey's  "  Foure  Letters,  1592,"  and 
that  literary  scourge  of  Nash's,  "  Have  with  you  to  Saf- 
fron-Walden  (Harvey's  residence),  or  Gabriel  Harvey's 
Hunt  is  vp,  1596  ;"  pamphlets  now  as  costly  as  if  they 
consisted  of  leaves  of  gold.  * 

confessed  he  is  a  Poet,  which  he  never  appears  in  his  English  hexame- 
ters:— 

John  Harvey  the  Physician's  "Welcome  to  Robert  Greene  1 
"  Come,  fellow  Greene,  come  to  thy  gaping  grave, 

Bid  vanity  and  foolery  farewell, 
That  ouerlong  hast  plaid  the  mad-brained  knaue, 

And  ouerloud  hast  rung  the  bawdy  bell. 
Termine  to  vermine  must  repair  at  last ; 

No  fitter  house  for  busie  folke  to  dwell; 
Thy  conny-catching  pageants  are  past.f 

Some  other  must  those  arrant  stories  tell ; 
These  hungry  wormes  thinke  long  for  their  repast; 

Come  on ;  I  pardon  thy  offence  to  me ; 
It  was  thy  living;  be  not  so  aghast  ! 

A  fool  and  a  physitian  may  agree  ! 

And  for  my  brothers  never  vex  thyself; 

They  are  not  to  disease  a  buried  elfe." 

*  Sir  Egerton  Brydges  in  his  reprint  of  "  Greene's  Groatsworth  of 
Wit,"  has  given  the  only  passage  from  "  The  Quip  for  an  Upstart 
Courtier,"    which  at  all  alludes  to  Harvey's  father.     He  says   with 

{  Greene  had  written  "  The  Art  of  Coney-catching."  He  was  a 
great  adept  in  the  arts  of  a  town-life. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  185 

Nash,  who,  in  his  other  works,  writes  in  a  style  as 
flowing  as  Addison's,  with  hardly  an  obsolete  vestige, 
has  rather  injured  this  literary  invective  by  the  evident 
burlesque  he  affects  of  Harvey's  pedantic  idiom;  and  for 
this  Mr.  Malone  has  hastily  censured  him,  without  recol- 
lecting the  aim  of  this  modern  Lucian.  *  The  delicacy 
of  irony  ;  the  sons-entendu,  that  subtlety  of  indicating 
what  is  not  told  ;  all  that  p  >ignant  satire,  which  is  the 
keener  for  its  polish,  were  not  practised  by  our  first  ve- 
hement satirists;  but  a  bantering  masculine  humour,  a 

great  justice,  "there  seems  nothing  in  it  sufficiently  offensive  to  account 
for  the  violence  of  Harvey's  anger."  The  Rev.  A.  Dyce,  so  well 
known  from  his  varied  researches  in  our  dramatic  literature,  is  of 
opinion  that  the  offensive  passage  li  is  been  removed  from  the  editions 
which  have  come  down  to  us.  Without  some  such  key  it  is  impossi- 
ble to  comprehend  Harvey's  implacable  hatred,  or  the  words  of  himself 
and  friends  when  they  describe  Greene  as  an  "impudent  railer  in  an 
odious  and  desperate  mood,"  or  his  satire  as  "  spiteful  and  villanous 
abuse."  The  occasiouof  the  quarrel  was  an  attack  by  Richard  Harvey 
who  had  the  folly  to  "mis-terra  all  our  poets  and  writers  about  Lon- 
don, piperly  make-plays  and  make-bat  is"  as  Mash  informs  us;  "  hence 
Greene  being  chief  agent  to  the  company,  for  he  writ  more  than  four 
other,  took  occasion  to  canvass  him  a  little, — about  some  seven  or 
eight  lines,  which  hath  plucked  on  an  invective  of  so  many  leaves". 
—Ed. 

*  Nash  was  a  great  favourite  with  the  wits  of  his  day.  Oue  calls 
him  "our  true  English  Aretiue,"  another  "Sweet  satyric  Nash,"  a 
third  describes  his  Muse  as  "  armed  with  a  gag-tooth  (a  tusk),  and  his 
pen  possessed  with  Hercules's  furies."  He  is  well  characterised  in 
"The  Return  from  Parnassus." 

"  His  style  was  witty,  tho'  he  had  some  gall : 

Something  he  might  have  mended,  so  may  all ; 

Yet  this  I  say,  that  for  a  mother's  wit. 

Few  men  have  ever  seen  the  like  of  it." 

Nash  abounds  with  "  Mother-wit ;"  but  he  was  also  educated  at  the 
University,  with  every  advantage  of  classical  studies. 


ISO  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

style  stamped  in  the  heat  of  fancy,  with  all  the  life- 
touches  of  strong  individuality,  characterise  these  licen- 
tious wits.  They  wrote  then  as  the  old  fabliers  told  their 
tales,  naming  everything  by  its  name  ;  our  refinement 
cannot  approve,  but  it  cannot  diminish  their  real  nature, 
and  among  our  elaborate  graces,  their  naivete  must  be 
still  wanting. 

In  this  literary  satire  Xash  has  interwoven  a  kind 
of  ludicrous  biography  of  Harvey  ;  and  seems  to  have 
anticipated  the  character  of  Martinus  Scribleros.  I 
leave  the  grosser  parts  of  this  invective  untouched ; 
for  my  business  is  not  with  slander,  but  with  ridi- 
cule. 

Xash  opens  as  a  skilful  lampooner ;  he  knew  well  that 
ridicule,  without  the  appearance  of  truth,  was  letting  fly 
an  arrow  upwards,  touching  no  one.  Xash  accounts  for 
his  protracted  silence  by  adroitly  declaring  that  he  had 
taken  these  two  or  three  years  to  get  perfect  intelligence 
of  Harvey's  "  Life  and  conversation ;  one  true  point 
whereof  well  sat  downe  will  more  excruciate  him  than 
knocking  him  about  the  ears  with  his  oicn  style  in  a  hun- 
dred sheets  of  paper." 

And  with  great  humour  says — 

"  As  long  as  it  is  since  he  writ  against  me,  so  long 
have  I  given  him  a  lease  of  his  life,  and  he  hath  only  held 
it  by  my  mercy;  and  now  let  him  thank  his  friends  for 
this  heavy  load  of  disgrace  I  lay  upon  him,  since  I  do  it 
but  to  show  my  sufficiency  ;  and  they  urging  what  a 
triumph  he  had  over  me,  hath  made  me  ransack  my 
standish  more  than  I  would." 


LITERARY   RIDICULE.  137 

In  the  history  of  such  a  literary  hero  as  Gabriel,  the 
birth  has  ever  been  attended  by  portents.  Gabriel's 
mother  "  dreamt  a  dream,"  that  she  was  delivered  "  of 
an  immense  elder  gun  that  can  shoot  nothing  but  pellets 
of  chewed  paper ;  and  thought,  instead  of  a  boy,  she  was 
brought  to  bed  of  one  of  those  kistrell  birds  called  a 
wind-sucker."  At  the  moment  of  his  birth  came  into  the 
world  "a  calf  with  a  double  tongue,  and  eares  longer 
than  any  ass's,  with  his  feet  turned  backwards."  Fa- 
cetious analogies  of  Gabriel's  literary  genius  ! 

He  then  paints  to  the  life  the  grotesque  portrait  of 
Harvey ;  so  that  the  man  himself  stands  alive  before  us. 
"  He  was  of  an  adust  swarth  choleric  dye,  like  rustie  ba- 
con, or  a  dried  scate-fish  ;  his  skin  riddled  and  crumpled 
like  apiece  of  burnt  parchment,  with  channels  and  creases 
in  his  face,  and  wrinkles  and  frets  of  old  age."  Nash 
dexterously  attributes  this  premature  old  age  to  his  own 
talents ;  exulting  humorously — 

"  I  have  brought  him  low,  and  shrewdly  broken  him ; 
look  on  his  head,  and  you  shall  find  a  gray  haire  for 
euerie  line  I  have  writ  against  him ;  and  you  shall  haue 
all  his  beard  white  too  by  the  time  he  hath  read  ouer  this 
booke." 

To  give  a  finishing  to  the  portrait,  and  to  reach  the 
climax  of  personal  contempt,  he  paints  the  sordid  misery 
in  which  he  lived  at  Saffron-Walden  : — "  Enduring  more 
hardness  than  a  camell,  who  will  liue  four  dayes  without 
water,  and  feedes  on  nothing  but  thistles  and  wormwood, 
as  he  feeds  on  his  estate  on  trotters,  sheep  porknells,  and 
buttered  rootes,  in  an  hexameter  meditation." 


1S8  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

In  his  Venetian  velvet  and  pantofles  of  pride,  we  are 
told— 

"  He  looks,  indeed,  like  a  case  of  tooth-pickes,  or  a  lute- 
pin  stuck  in  a  suit  of  apparell.  An  Vsher  of  a  dancing- 
Bchoole,  lie  is  such  a  basia  de  vmbra  de  vmbra  de  los pedes  : 
a  kisser  of  the  shadow  of  your  feetes  shadow  he  is  !" 

This  is,  doubtless,  a  portrait  resembling  the  original, 
with  its  Cervantic  touches ;  Xash  would  not  have  risked 
what  the  eyes  of  his  readers  would  instantly  have  proved 
to  be  fictitious ;  and,  in  fact,  though  the  Grcutgerites 
know  of  no  portrait  of  Gabriel  Harvey,  they  will  find  a 
woodcut  of  him  by  the  side  of  this  description  ;  it  is, 
indeed,  in  a  most  pitiable  attitude,  expressing  that  gripe 
of  criticism  which  seized  on  Gabriel  "  upon  the  news  of 
the  going  in  hand  of  my  booke." 

The  ponderosity  and  prolixity  of  Gabriel's  "  period  of 
a  mile,"  are  described  with  a  facetious  extravagance, 
which  may  be  given  as  a  specimen  of  the  eloquence  of 
ridicule.  Harvey  entitled  his  various  pamphlets  "  Let- 
ters." 

"More  letters  yet  from  the  doctor?  Out  upon  it, 
here's  a  packet  of  epistling,  as  bigge  as  a  packe  of  wool- 
len cloth,  or  a  stack  of  salt  fish.  Carrier,  didst  thou 
bring  it  by  wayne,  or  by  horsebacke  ?  By  wayne,  sir, 
and  it  hath  crackt  me  three  axle-trees. — Ileavie  newes ! 
Take  them  again  !  I  will  never  open  them. — My  cart 
(quoth  he,  deep-sighing,)  hath  cryde  creake  under  them 
fortie  times  euerie  furlong  ;  wherefore  if  you  be  a  good 
man  rather  make  mud-walls  with  them,  mend  highways, 
or  damme  up  quagmires  with  them. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  ISO 

"  When  I  came  to  unrip  and  unbumbast*  this  Gar- 
gantuan bag  pudding,  and  found  nothing  in  it  but  dogs 
tripes,  swines  livers,  oxc  galls,  and  sheepes  gnts,  I  was  in 
a  bitterer  chafe  than  anie  cooke  at  a  long  sermon,  when 
his  meat  burnes. 

"O  'tis  an  vnsconscionable  vast  gor-bellied  volume, 
bigger  bnlkt  than  a  Dutch  hoy,  and  more  cumbersome 
than  a  payre  of  Switzer's  galeaze  breeches."  f 

And  in  the  same  ludicrous  style  he  writes — 

"  One  epistle  thereof  to  John  Wolfe  (Harvey's  printer) 
I  took  and  weighed  in  an  ironmonger's  scale,  and  it 
counter  poyseth  a  cadej  of  herrings  with  three  Holland 
cheeses.  It  was  rumoured  about  the  Court  that  the  guard 
meant  to  trie  masteries  with  it  before  the  Queene,  and 
instead  of  throwing  the  sledge,  or  the  hammer,  to  hurle 
it  foorth  at  the  amies  end  for  a  wager. 

"  Sixe  and  thirtie  sheets  it  comprehendeth,  which  with 
him  is  but  sixe  and  thirtie  full  points  (periods)  ;  for  he 
makes  no  more  difference  'twixt  a  sheet  of  paper  and  a 
full  pointe,  than  there  is  'twixt  two  black  puddings  for  a 
pennie,  and  a  pennie  for  a  pair  of  black  puddings.  Yet 
these  are  but  the  shortest  prouerbs  of  his  wit,  for  he 

*  Bombast  was  the  tailors'  term  in  the  Elizabethan  era  for  the  stuff- 
ing of  horsehair  or  wool  used  for  the  large  breeches  then  in  fashion; 
hence  the  term  was  applied  to  hig-h-sounding  phrases — "  all  sound 
and  fury,  signifying  nothing." — Ed. 

f  These  were  the  loose  heavy  breeches  so  constantly  worn  by 
Swiss  soldiers  as  to  become  a  national  costume,  and  which  has  been 
handed  down  to  us  by  the  artist3  of  the  day  in  a  variety  of  forms. 
They  obtained  the  name  of  galeaze,  from  their  supposed  restmblanco 
to  the  broad-bottomed  ship  called  a  galliass. — Ed. 

%  A  cade  is  500  herrings;  a  great  quantity  of  an  article  of  no  value. 


190  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

never  bids  a  man  good  morrow,  but  he  makes  a  speech 
as  long  as  a  proclamation,  nor  drinkes  to  anie,  but  he 
reads  a  lecture  of  three  howers  long,   de  Arte  bibendi. 

0  'tis  a  precious  apothegmatieal  pedant." 

It  was  the  foible  of  Harvey  to  wish  to  conceal  the 
humble  avocation  of  his  father:  this  forms  a  perpetual 
source  of  the  bitterness  or  the  pleasantry  of  Nash,  who, 
indeed,  calls  his  pamphlet  "  a  full  answer  to  the  eldest 
son  of  the  halter  maker,"  which,  he  says,  "  is  death  to 
Gabriel  to  remember;  wherefore  from  time  to  time  he 
doth  nothing  but  turmoile  his  thoughts  how  to  invent 
new  pedigrees,  and  what  great  nobleman's  bastard  he 
was  likely  to  be,  not  whose  sonne  he  is  reputed  to  be. 
Yet  he  would  not  have  a  shoo  to  put  on  his  foote  if  his 
father  had  not  traffiqued  with  the  hangman. — Harvey 
nor  his  brothers  cannot  bear  to  be  called  the  sonnes  of 
a  rope-maker,  which,  by  his  private  confession  to  some 
of  my  friends,  was  the  only  thing  that  most  set  him 
afire  against  me.  Turne  over  his  two  bookes  he  hath 
published  against  me,  wherein  he  hath  clapt  paper  God's 
plentie,  if  that  could  press  a  man  to  death,  and  see  if,  in 
the  waye  of  answer,  or  otherwise,  he  once  mentioned  the 
a  >rd  rope-maker,  or  come  within  forty  foot  of  it;  except 
in  one  place  of  his  first  booke,  where  he  nameth  it  not 
neither,  but  goes  thus  cleanly  to  worke: — 'and  may  not 
a  good  sonne  have  a  reprobate  for  his  father  ?'  a  peri- 
phrase  of  a  rope-maker,  which,  if  I  should  shryue  myself, 

1  never  heard  before."  According  to  Nash,  Gabriel 
took  his  oath  before  a  justice,  that  his  father  was  an 
honest  man,  and  kept  his  sons  at  the  Universities  a  long 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  191 

time.  "  I  confirmed  it,  and  added,  Ay  !  which  is  more, 
three  proud  sonnes,  that  when  they  met  the  hangman, 
their  father's  best  customer,  would  not  put  off  their  hats 
to  him — " 

Such  repeated  raillery  on  this  foible  of  Harvey  touched 
him  nfore  to  the  quick,  and  more  raised  the  public  laugh, 
than  any  other  point  of  attack ;  for  it  was  merited. 
Another  foible  was,  perhaps,  the  finical  richness  of  Har- 
vey's dress,  adopting  the  Italian  fashions  on  his  return 
from  Italy,  "  when  he  made  no  bones  of  taking  the  wall 
of  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  in  his  black  Venetian  velvet."*  On 
this  the  fertile  invention  of  Nash  raises  a  scandalous 
anecdote  concerning  Gabriel's  wardrobe ;  "  a  tale  of  his 
hobby-horse  reuelling  and  domineering  at  Audley-end, 
when  the  Queen  was  there ;  to  which  place  Gabriel 
came  ruffling  it  out,  hufty  tufty,  in  his  suit  of  veluet — " 
which  he  had  "  untrussed,  and  pelted  the  outside  from 
the  lining  of  an  old  velvet  saddle  he  had  borrowed  !" 
"The  rotten  mould  of  that  worm-eaten  relique,  he 
means,  when  he  dies,  to  hang  over  his  tomb  for  a  monu- 

*  Harvey's  love  of  dress,  and  desire  to  indulge  it  cheaply,  is  satiri- 
cally alluded  to  by  Nash,  in  confuting  Harvey's  assertion  that 
Greene's  wardrobe  at  his  death  was  not  worth  more  than  three  shil- 
lings— "  I  know  a  broker  in  a  spruce  leather  jerkin  shall  give  you 
thirty  shillings  for  the  doublet  alone,  if  you  can  help  him  to  it.  Hark 
in  your  ear  1  he  had  a  very  fair  cloak,  with  sleeves  of  a  goose  green, 
it  would  serve  you  as  fine  as  maybe.  No  more  words;  if  you  be 
wise,  play  the  good  husband,  and  listen  after  it,  you  may  buy  it  ten 
shillings  better  cheap  than  it  cost  him.  By  St.  Silver,  it  is  good  to  be 
circumspect  in  casting  for  the  world ;  there's  a  great  many  ropes  go 
to  ten  shillings?  If  you  want  a  greasy  pair  of  silk  stockings  to  shew 
yourself  in  the  court,  they  are  there  to  be  had  too,  amongst  his  move- 
ables."— Ed. 


192  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

ment"*  Harvey  was  proud  of  his  refined  skill  in  "  Tits- 
can  authors,"  and  too  fond  of  their  worse  conceits. 
Nash  alludes  to  his  travels  in  Italy,  "  to  fetch  him  two- 
penny worth  of  Tuscanisra,  quite  renouncing  his  natural 
English  accents  and  gestures,  wrested  himself  wholly  to 
the  Italian  punctilios,  painting  himself  like  a  courtezan, 
till  the  Queen  declared,  'he  looked  something  like  an 
Italian !'  At  which  he  roused  his  plumes,  pricked  his 
ears,  and  run  away  with  the  bridle  betwixt  his  teeth." 
These  were  malicious  tales,  to  make  his  adversary  con- 
temptible, whenever  the  merry  wits  at  court  were  will- 
ing to  sharpen  themselves  on  him. 

One  of  the  most  difficult  points  of  attack  was  to  break 
through  that  bastion  of  sonnets  and  panegyrics  with 
which  Harvey  had  fortified  himself  by  the  aid  of  his 
friends,  against  the  assaults  of  Nash.  Harvey  had  been 
commended  by  the  learned  and  the  ingenious.  Our 
Lucian,  with  his  usual  adroitness,  since  he  could  not 
deny  Harvey's  intimacy  with  Spenser  and  Sidney,  gets 
rid  of  their  suffrages  by  this  malicious  sarcasm:  "It  is  a 
miserable  thing  for  a  man  to  be  said  to  have  had 
friends,  and  now  to  have  neer  a  one  left  !"  As  for  the 
others,  whom  Harvey  calls  "  his  gentle  and  liberall 
friends,"  Xash  boldly  caricatures  the  grotesque  crew,  as 
"  tender  itchie  brained  infants,  that  cared  not  what  they 
did,  so  they  might  come  in  print;  worthless  whippets, 

*  This  unlucky  Venetian  velvet  coat  of  Harvey  had  also  produced 
a  "  Quippe  for  an  Vpstart  Courtier,  or  a  quaint  dispute  between  Vel- 
uet-breeches  and  Cloth-breeches,"  which  poor  Harvey  declares  was 
'one  of  the  most  licentious  and  intolerable  invectives."  This  blow 
had  been  struck  by  Greene  on  the  "  Italiauated  "  Courtier. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  193 

and  jackstraws,  "who  meeter  it  in  his  commendation, 
whom  he  would  compare  with  the  highest."  The  works 
of  these  young  writers  he  describes  by  an  image  ex- 
quisitely ludicrous  and  satirical : — 

"  These  mushrumpes,  who  pester  the  world  with  their 
pamphlets,  are  like  those  barbarous  people  in  the  hot 
countries,  who,  when  they  have  bread  to  make,  doe  no 
more  than  clap  the  dowe  upon  a  post  on  the  outside  of 
their  houses,  and  there  leave  it  to  the  sun  to  bake ;  so 
their  indigested  conceipts,  far  rawer  than  anie  dowe,  at 
all  adventures  upon  the  post  they  clap,  pluck  them  off 
who  will,  and  think  they  have  made  as  good  a  batch  of 
poetrie  as  may  be.'* 

Of  Harvey's  list  of  friends  he  observes : — 

"To  a  bead-roll  of  learned  men  and  lords,  he  appeals, 
whether  he  be  an  asse  or  not  ?" 

Harvey  had  said,  " Thomas  Nash,  from  the  top  of  his 
wit  looking  down  upon  simple  creatures,  calleth  Gabriel 
Harvey  a  dunce,  a  foole,  an  ideot,  a  dolt,  a  goose  cap, 
an  asse,  and  so  forth ;  for  some  of  the  residue  is  not  to 
be  spoken  but  with  his  owne  mannerly  mouth;  but  he 
should  have  shewed  particulate  which  wordes  in  my 
letters  were  the  wordes  of  a  dunce ;  which  sentences  the 
sentences  of  a  foole ;  which  arguments  the  arguments 
of  an  ideot ;  which  opinions  the  opinions  of  a  dolt ; 
which  judgments  the  judgments  of  a  goose-cap ;  which 
conclusions  the  conclusions  of  an  asse."  * 

Thus  Harvey  reasons,  till  he  becomes  unreasonable; 
one  would  have  imagined  that  the  literary  satires  of  our 

*  "Pierce's  Supererogation,  or  a  new  praise  of  the  Old  Asse,"  1593. 
13 


19J:  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

English  Lucian  had  been  voluminous  enough,  without 
the  mathematical  demonstration.  The  banterers  seem 
to  have  put  poor  Harvey  nearly  out  of  his  wits ;  he  and 
his  friends  felt  their  blows  too  profoundly ;  they  were 
much  too  thin-skinned,  and  the  solemn  air  of  Harvey 
in  his  graver  moments  at  their  menaces  is  exceedingly 
ludicrous.  They  frequently  called  him  Gabrielissime 
Gabriel,  which  quintessence  of  himself  seems  to  have 
mightily  affected  him.  They  threatened  to  confute  his 
letters  till  eternity — which  seems  to  have  put  him  in 
despair.  The  following  passage,  descriptive  of  Gabriel's 
distresses,  may  excite  a  smile. 

"This  grand  confuter  of  my  letters  says,  '  Gabriel,  if 
there  be  any  wit  or  Industrie  in  thee,  now  I  will  dare  it 
to  the  vttermost ;  write  of  what  thou  wilt,  in  what  lan- 
guage thou  wilt,  and  I  will  confute  it,  and  answere  it. 
Take  Truth's  part,  and  I  will  proouve  truth  to  be  no 
truth,  marching  ovt  of  thy  dung-voiding  mouth.'  He 
will  never  leave  me  as  long  as  he  is  able  to  lift  a  pen,  ad 
infinitum;  if  I  reply,  he  has  a  rejoinder;  and  for  my 
brief  triplication,  he  is  prouided  with  a  quad  rapHcat  ion, 
and  so  he  mangles  my  sentences,  hacks  my  arguments, 
wrenches  my  words,  chops  and  changes  my  phrases, 
even  to  the  disjoyning  and  dislocation  of  my  whole 
meaning." 

Poor  Harvey!  he  knew  not  that  there  was  nothing 
real  in  ridicule,  no  end  to  its  merry  malice  ! 

Harvey's  taste  for  hexameter  verses,  which  he  so  un- 
naturally forced  into  our  language,  is  admirably  ridi- 
culed.    Harvey  had  shown  his  taste  for  these  metres  by 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  195 

a  variety  of  poems,  to  whose  subjects  Nash  thus  sarcas- 
tically alludes: — 

"  It  had  grown  with  him  into  such  a  dictionary  cus- 
tom, that  no  may-pole  in  the  street,  no  wethercocke  on 
anie  church-steeple,  no  arbour,  no  lawrell,  no  yewe-tree, 
he  would  ouerskip,  without  hayling  in  this  manner. 
After  supper,  if  he  chancst  to  play  at  cards  with  a  queen 
of  harts  in  his  hands,  he  would  run  upon  men's  and 
women's  hearts  all  the  night." 

And  he  happily  introduces  here  one  of  the  miserable 
hexameter  conceits  of  Harvey — 

Stout  hart  and  sweet  hart,  yet  stoutest  hart  to  be  stooped. 

Harvey's  "  Encomium  Lauri  "  thus  ridiculously  com- 
mences, 

What  might  I  call  this  tree  ?     A  lawrell  ?     0  bonny  lawrell, 
Keedes  to  thy  bowes  will  I  bow  this  knee,  and  vayle  my  bonetto ; 

which  Nash  most  happily  burlesques  by  describing 
Harvey  under  a  yew-tree  at  Trinity-hall,  composing 
verses  on  the  weathercock  of  Allhallows  in  Cam- 
bridge : — 

0  thou  wether-cocke  that  stands  on  the  top  of  Allhallows, 
Come  thy  wales  down,  if  thou  d.irst,  for  thy  crowne,  and  take 
the  wall  on  us. 

"  The  hexameter  verse  (says  Nash)  I  graunt  to  be  a 
gentleman  of  an  auncient  house  (so  is  many  an  English 
beggar),  but  this  clyme  of  our's  hee  cannot  thrive  in; 
our  speech  is  too  craggy  for  him  to  set  his  plough  in  ;  hee 
goes  twitching  and  hopping  in  our  language,  like  a  man 
running  vpon  quagmires,  vp  the  hill  in  one  syllable  and 


196  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

down  the  dale  in  another,  retaining  no  part  of  that  stately 
smooth  gate  which  he  vaunts  himself  with  amongst  the 
Greeks  and  Latins." 

The  most  humorous  part  in  this  Scribleriad,  is  a  ludi- 
crous narrative  of  Harvey's  expedition  to  the  metropolis, 
for  the  sole  purpose  of  writing  his  "Pierce  Supereroga- 
tion," pitted  against  Nash's  "  Pierce's  Pennilesse."  T lie 
facetious  Nash  describes  the  torpor  and  pertinacity  of  his 
genius,  by  telling  u>  he  had  kept  Harvey  at  work — 

"  For  seaven  and  thirtie  weekes  space  while  he  lay  at 
his  printer's,  Wolfe,  never  stirring  out  of  doors,  or  being 
churched  all  that  while — and  that  in  the  deadest  season 
that  might  bee,  bee  lying  in  the  ragingest  furie  of  the 
last  plague  where  there  dyde  above  1600  a  weeke  in 
London,  ink-squittring  and  saracenically  printing  against 
mee.  Three  quarters  of  a  year  thus  immured  bee  re- 
mained, with  his  spirits  yearning  empassionment,  and 
agonised  fury,  thirst  of  revenge,  neglecting  soul  and 
bodies  health  to  compasse  it — sweating  and  dealing  upon 
it  most  intentively."  * 

The  narrative  proceeds  with  the  many  perils  which 
Harvey's  printer  encountered,  by  expense  of  diet,  and 
printing  for  this  bright  genius  and  his  friends,  whose 
works  "  would  rust  and  iron-spot  paper  to  have  their 
names  breathed  over  it;"  and  that  Wolfe  designed  "to 

*  Harvey's  opponents  were  much  nimbler  penmen,  and  could  strike 
offthes2  lampoons  with  all  the  facility  of  writers  for  the  stage.  Thus 
Nash  declare?,  in  his  "  Have  with  you  to  Saffron  TValden,"  that  lie 
leaves  Lilly,  who  was  also  attacked,  to  defend  himself,  because  "in 
as  much  time  as  he  spends  in  taking  tobacco  one  week,  lie  can  compila 
that  would  make  Gabriell  repent  himself  all  his  life  after." — Ed. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  197 

get  a  privilege  betimes,  forbidding  of  all  others  to  sell 
waste-paper  but  himselfe."  The  climax  of  the  narrative, 
after  many  misfortunes,  ends  with  Harvey  being  arrested 
by  the  printer,  and  confined  to  Newgate,  where  his  sword 
is  taken  from  him,  to  his  perpetual  disgrace.  So  much 
did  Gabriel  endure  for  having  written  a  book  against 
Tom  Nash ! 

But  Harvey  might  deny  some  of  these  ludicrous  facts. 
— Will  he  deny  ?  cries  Xash — and  here  he  has  woven  every 
tale  the  most  watchful  malice  could  collect,  varnished 
for  their  full  effect.     Then  he  adds, 

"  You  see  I  have  brought  the  doctor  out  of  request  at 
court ;  and  it  shall  cost  me  a  fall,  but  I  will  get  him  howt- 
ed  out  of  the  Vniuersitie  too,  ere  I  giue  him  ouer." 
He  tells  us  Harvey  was  brought  on  the  stage  at  Trinity- 
college,  in  "  the  exquisite  comedie  of  Pedantius,"  where, 
under  "  the  finical  fine  school-master,  the  just  manner  of 
his  phrase,  they  stufft  his  mouth  with ;  and  the  whole 
buffianisme  throughout  his  bookes,  they  bolstered  out 
his  part  with — euen  to  the  carrying  of  his  gowne,  his 
nice  gate  in  his  pantofles,  or  the  affected  accent  of  his 
speech — Let  him  deny  that  there  was  a  shewe  made  at 
Clare-hall  of  him  and  his  brothers,  called  Tarrarantantara 
turba  tumultuosa  Trigonum  Tri-Harveyorum  Tri-har- 
monia ;  and  another  shewe  of  the  little  minnow  his 
brother,  at  Peter-house,  called  Duns  furens,  Dick  Harvey 
in  a  frensie."  The  sequel  is  thus  told : — "  Whereupon 
Dick  came  and  broke  the  college  glass  windows,  and  Dr. 
Perne  caused  him  to  be  set  in  the  stockes  till  the  shewe 
was  ended." 


19S  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

This  "Duns  furens,  Dick  Harvey  iu  a  frensie,"  was 
not  only  the  brother  of  one  who  ranked  high  in  society 
and  literature,  but  himself  a  learned  professor.  Nash 
brings  him  down  to  "Pigmey  Dick,  that  lookes  like  a 
pound  of  goldsmith's  candles,  who  had  like  to  commit 
folly  last  year  with  a  milk-maid,  as  a  friend  of  his  very 
soberly  informed  me.  Little  and  little-wittied  Dick,  that 
hath  vowed  to  live  and  die  in  defence  of  Brutus  and  his 
Trojans."*  An  Herculean  feat  of  this  "Duns  furens," 
Xash  tells  us,  was  his  setting  Aristotle  with  his  heels 
upwards  on  the  school-gates  at  Cambridge1  and  putting 
ass's  ears  on  his  head,  which  Tom  here  records  m  per- 
petuam  rei  raemorianx.  But  "Wood,  our  grave  and  keen 
literary  antiquary,  observes — 

"  To  let  pass  other  matters  these  vain  men  (the  wits) 
report  of  Richard  Harvey,  his  works  show  him  quite 
another  person  than  what  they  make  him  to  be." 

Xash  then  forms  a  ludicrous  contrast  between  "  witless 
Gabriel  and  ruffling  Richard."  The  astronomer  Richard 
was  continually  baiting  the  great  bear  in  the  firmament, 
and  in  his  lectures  set  up  atheistical  questions,  which 
Xash  maliciously  adds,  "as  I  am  afraid  the  earth  would 
swallow  me  if  I  should  but  rehearse."  And  at  his  close, 
N;ish  bitterly  regrets  he  has  no  more  room;  "else  I 
should  make  Gabriel  a  fugitive  out  of  England,  being 
the  rauenousest  slouen  that  ever  lapt  porridge  in  noble- 
men's houses,  where  has  had  already,   out   of  two,  his 

*  He  had  written  an  antiquarian  work  on  the  descent  of  Brutus  on 
our  island. — The  party  also  who  at  the  University  attacked  the 
opinions  of  Aristotle  were  nicknamed  the  Trojans,  as  determined 
enemic-s  of  the  Greeks. 


LITERARY    RIDICULE.  1Q0 

mittimus  of  Ye  may  be  gone  !  for  he  was  a  sower  of 
seditious  paradoxes  amongst  kitchen-boys."  Nash  seems 
to  have  considered  himself  as  terrible  as  an  Archilochus, 
whose  satires  were  so  fatal  as  to  induce  the  satirised, 
after  having  read  them,  to  hang  themselves. 

How  ill  poor  Harvey  passed  through  these  wit-duels, 
and  how  profoundly  the  wounds  inflicted  on  him  and 
his  brothers  were  felt,  appears  by  his  own  confessions. 
In  his  "  Foure  Letters,"  after  some  curious  observations 
on  invectives  and  satires,  from  those  of  Archilochus,  Lu- 
cian,  and  Aretine,  to  Skelton  and  Scoggin,  and  "  the  whole 
venomous  and  viperous  brood  of  old  and  new  raylers," 
he  proceeds  to  blame  even  his  beloved  friend  the  gentle 
Spenser,  for  the  severity  of  his  "Mother  Hubbard's 
Tale,"  a  satire  on  the  court.  "  I  must  needes  say,  Mother 
Hubbard  in  heat  of  choller,  forgetting  the  pure  sanguine 
of  her  Sweete  Feary  Queene,  artfully  ouershott  her  mal- 
content-selfe ;  as  elsewhere  I  have  specified  at  large,  with 
the  good  leaue  of  vnspotted  friendship. — Sallust  and 
Clodius  learned  of  Tully  to  frame  artificiall  declamations 
and  patheticall  invectives  against  Tully  himselfe;  if 
Mother  Hubbard,  in  the  vaine  of  Chawcer,  happen  to  tel 
one  canicular  tale,  father  Elderton  and  his  son  Greene,  in 
the  vaine  of  Skelton  or  Scoggin,  will  counterfeit  an  hun- 
dred dogged  fables,  libles,  slaunders,  lies,  for  the  whet- 
stone. But  many  will  sooner  lose  their  liues  than  the 
least  jott  of  their  reputation.  What  mortal  feudes,  what 
cruel  bloodshed,  what  terrible  slaughterdome  have  been 
committed  for  the  point  of  honour  and  some  few  courtly 
ceremonies." 


200  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

The  incidents  so  plentifully  narrated  in  this  Lucianic 
biography,  the  very  nature  of  this  species  of  satire 
throws  into  doubt ;  yet  they  still  seem  shadowed  out  from 
some  truths ;  hut  the  truths  who  can  unravel  from  the 
fictions?  And  thus  a  narrative  is  consigned  to  posterity 
which  involves  illustrious  characters  in  an  inextricable 
network  of  calumny  and  genius. 

Writers  of  this  class  alienate  themselves  from  human 
kind,  they  break  the  golden  bond  which  holds  them  to 
society ;  and  they  live  among  us  like  a  polished  banditti. 
In  these  copious  extracts,  I  have  not  noticed  the  more 
criminal  insinuations  against  the  Harveys ;  I  have  left 
the  grosser  slanders  untouched.  My  object  has  been 
only  to  trace  the  effects  of  ridicule,  and  to  detect  its 
artifices,  by  which  the  most  dignified  characters  may  be 
deeply  injured  at  the  pleasure  of  a  Ridicule r.  The  wild 
mirth  of  ridicule,  aggravating  and  taunting  real  imper- 
fections, and  fastening  imaginary  ones  on  the  victim  in 
idle  sport  or  ill-humour,  strikes  at  the  most  brittle  tiling 
in  the  world,  a  man's  good  reputation,  for  delicate 
matters  which  are  not  under  the  protection  of  the  law, 
but  in  which  so  much  of  personal  happiness  is  con- 
cerned. 


LITERARY  HATRED. 

EXHIBITING   A   CONSPIRACY   AGAINST   AN   AUTHOR. 

IN  the  peaceful  walks  of  literature  we  are  startled 
at  discovering  genius  with  the  mind,  and,  if  we 
conceive  the  instrument  it  guides  to  be  a  stiletto,  with 
the    hand    of    an   assassin — irascible,  vindictive,   armed 


LITERARY    HATRED.  201 

with  indiscriminate  satire,  never  pardoning  the  merit  of 
rival  genius,  but  fastening  on  it  throughout  life,  till,  in 
the  moral  retribution  of  human  nature,  these  very  pas- 
sions, by  their  ungratified  cravings,  have  tended  to 
annihilate  the  being  who  fostered  them.  These  passions 
among  literary  men  are  with  none  more  inextinguishable 
than  among  provincial  writers. — Their  bad  feelings  are 
concentrated  by  their  local  contraction.  The  proximity 
of  men  of  genius  seems  to  produce  a  familiarity  which 
excites  hatred  or  contempt ;  while  he  who  is  afflicted  with 
disordered  passions  imagines  that  he  is  urging  his  own 
claims  to  genius  by  denying  them  to  their  possessor.  A 
whole  life  passed  in  harassing  the  industry  or  the  genius 
which  he  has  not  equalled  ;  and  instead  of  running  the 
open  career  as  a  competitor,  only  skulking  as  an  assassin 
by  their  side,  is  presented  in  the  object  now  before  us. 

Dr.  Gilbert  Stuart  seems  early  in  life  to  have  devoted 
himself  to  literature ;  but  his  habits  were  irregular,  and 
his  passions  fierce.  The  celebrity  of  Robertson,  Blair, 
and  Henry,  with  other  Scottish  brothers,  diseased  his 
mind  with  a  most  envious  rancour.  He  confined  all  his 
literary  efforts  to  the  pitiable  motive  of  destroying  theirs  ; 
he  was  prompted  to  every  one  of  his  historical  works  by 
the  mere  desire  of  discrediting  some  work  of  Robertson; 
and  his  numerous  critical  labours  were  all  directed  to 
annihilate  the  genius  of  his  country.  How  he  converted 
his  life  into  its  own  scourge,  how  wasted  talents  he 
might  have  cultivated  into  perfection,  lost  every  trace  of 
humanity,  and  finally  perished,  devoured  by  his  own 
fiend-like  passions,— shall  be  illustrated  by  the  following 


OQO  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

narrative,  collected  from  a  correspondence  now  lying 
before  me,  which  the  author  carried  on  with  his  publisher 
in  London.  I  shall  copy  out  at  some  length  the  hopes 
and  disappointments  of  the  literary  adventurer — the 
colours  are  not  mine;  I  am  dipping  my  pencil  in  the 
palette  of  the  artist  himself. 

In  June,  1773,  was  projected  in  the  Scottish  capital 
"The  Edinburgh  Magazine  and  Review."  Stuart's 
letters  breathe  the  spirit  of  rapturous  confidence,  lie 
had  combined  the  sedulous  attention  of  the  intelligent 
Smellie,  who  was  to  be  the  printer,  with  some  very 
honourable  critics ;  Professor  Baron,  Dr.  Blacklock,  and 
Professor  Richardson ;  and  the  first  numbers  were  exe- 
cuted with  more  talent  than  periodical  publications  had 
then  exhibited.  But  the  hardiness  of  Stuart's  opinions, 
his  personal  attacks,  and  the  acrimony  of  his  literary 
libels,  presented  a  new  feature  in  Scottish  literature,  of 
such  ugliness  and  horror,  that  every  honourable  man 
soon  averted  his  face  from  this  boittefeu. 

He  designed  to  ornament  his  first  number  with — 

"A  print  of  my  Lord  Alonboddo  in  his  quadruped 
form.  I  must,  therefore,  most  earnestly  beg  that  you 
will  purchase  for  me  a  copy  of  it  in  some  of  the  Macaroni 
print  shops.  It  is  not  to  be  procured  at  Edinburgh. 
They  are  afraid  to  vend  it  here.  We  are  to  take  it  on 
the  footing  of  a  figure  of  an  animal,  not  yet  described; 
and  are  to  give  a  grave,  yet  satirical  account  of  it,  in  the 
manner  of  Buffon.  It  would  not  be  proper  to  allude  to 
his  lordship  but  in  a  very  distant  manner." 

It  was   not,  however,   ventured   on;   and  the  nonde- 


LITERARY    HATRED.  203 

script  animal  was  still  confined  to  the  windows  of  "  the 
Macaroni  print  shops."  It  was,  however,  the  bloom  of 
the  author's  fancy,  and  promised  all  the  mellow  fruits  it 
afterwards  produced. 

In  September  this  ardour  did  not  abate : — 

"  The  proposals  are  issued ;  the  subscriptions  in  the 
booksellers'  shops  astonish ;  correspondents  flock  in ; 
and,  what  will  surprise  you,  the  timid  proprietors  of  the 
'  Scots'  Magazine'  have  come  to  the  resolution  of  drop- 
ping their  work.     You  stare  at  all  this,  and  so  do  I  too." 

Thus  he  flatters  himself  he  is  to  annihilate  his  rival, 
without  even  striking  the  first  blow.  The  appearance 
of  his  first  number  is  to  be  the  moment  when  their  last 
is  to  come  forth.  Authors,  like  the  discoverers  of  mines, 
are  the  most  sanguine  creatures  in  the  world :  Gilbert 
Stuart  afterwards  flattered  himself  Dr.  Henry  was  lying 
at  the  point  of  death  from  the  scalping  of  his  tomahawk 
pen ;  but  of  this  anon. 

On  the  publication  of  the  first  number,  in  November, 
1773,  all  is  exultation;  and  an  account  is  facetiously  ex- 
pected that  "  a  thousand  copies  had  emigrated  from  the 
Row  and  Fleet-street." 

There  is  a  serious  composure  in  the  letter  of  Decem- 
ber, which  seems  to  be  occasioned  by  the  tempered 
answer  of  his  London  correspondent.  The  work  was 
more  suited  to  the  meridian  of  Edinburgh ;  and  from 
causes  sufficiently  obvious,  its  personality  and  causticity. 
Stuart,  however,  assures  his  friend  that  "the  second 
number  you  will  find  better  than  the  first,  and  the  third 
better  than  the  second." 


204.  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

The  next  letter  is  dated  March  4, 1774,  in  which  I  find 
our  author  still  in  good  spirits  : — ■ 

"  The  Magazine  rises,  and  promises  much,  in  this 
quarter.  Our  artillery  has  silenced  all  opposition.  The 
rogues  of  the  '  uplifted  hands '  decline  the  combat." 
These  rogues  are  the  clergy,  and  some  others,  who  had 
"  uplifted  hands  "  from  the  vituperative  nature  of  their 
adversary  ;  for  he  tells  us  that,  "  now  the  clergy  are  silent, 
the  town-council  have  had  the  presumption  to  oppose  us  ; 
and  have  threatened  Creech  (the  publisher  in  Edinburgh) 
with  the  terror  of  making  him  a  constable  for  his  inso- 
lence. A  pamphlet  on  the  abuses  of  Heriot's  Hospital, 
including  a  direct  proof  of  perjury  in  the  provost,  was 
the  punishment  inflicted  in  return.  And  new  papers  are 
forging  to  chastise  them,  in  regard  to  the  poors'  rate, 
which  is  again  started  ;  the  improper  choice  of  professors  ; 
and  violent  stretches  of  the  impost.  The  liberty  of  the 
press,  in  its  fullest  extent,  is  to  be  employed  against 
them." 

Such  is  the  language  of  reform,  and  the  spirit  of  a  re- 
formist !  A  little  private  malignity  thus  ferments  a  good 
deal  of  public  spirit;  but  patriotism  must  be  inde- 
pendent to  be  pure.  If  the  "  Edinburgh  Review"  con- 
tinues to  succeed  in  its  sale,  as  Stuart  fancies,  Edinburgh 
itself  may  be  in  some  danger.  His  perfect  contempt  of  his 
contemporaries  is  amusing  : — 

"  Monboddo's  second  volume  is  published,  and,  with 
Kaimes,  will  appear  in  our  next;  the  former  is  a  childish 
performance;  the  latter  rather  better.  We  are  to  treat 
them  with  a  "ood  deal  of  freedom.     I  observe  an  amaz- 


LITERARY    HATRED.  0Q5 

ing  fulling  off  in  the  English  Reviews.  We  beat  them 
hollow.  I  fancy  they  have  no  assistance  but  from  the 
Dissenters, — a  dull  body  of  men.  The  Monthly  will 
not  easily  recover  the  death  of  Hawkes worth  ;  and  I  sus- 
pect that  Langhorne  has  forsaken  them ;  for  I  sue  no 
longer  his  pen." 

We  are  now  hastening  to  the  sudden  and  the  moral 
catastrophe  of  our  tale.  The  thousand  copies  which  had 
emigrated  to  London  remained  there,  little  disturbed  by 
public  inquiry  ;  and  in  Scotland,  the  personal  animosity 
against  almost  every  literary  character  there,  which  had 
inflamed  the  sale,  became  naturally  the  latent  cause  of 
its  extinction ;  for  its  life  was  but  a  feverish  existence, 
and  its  florid  complexion  carried  with  it  the  seeds  of  its 
dissolution.  Stuart  at  length  quarrelled  with  his  coad- 
jutor, Smellie,  for  altering  his  reviews.  Smellie's  pru- 
dential dexterity  was  such,  that,  in  an  article  designed 
to  level  Lord  Kaimes  with  Lord  Monboddo,  the  whole 
libel  was  completely  metamorphosed  into  a  panegyric. 
They  were  involved  in  a  lawsuit  about  "  a  blasphemous 
paper."  And  now  the  enraged  Zoilus  complains  of  "  his 
hours  of  peevishness  and  dissatisfaction."  He  acknow- 
ledges that  "a  circumstance  had  happened  which  had 
broke  his  peace  and  ease  altogether  for  some  weeks." 
And  now  he  resolves  that  this  great  work  shall  quietly 
sink  into  a  mere  compilation  from  the  London  periodical 
works.  Such,  then,  is  the  progress  of  malignant  genius  ! 
The  author,  like  him  who  invented  the  brazen  bull  of 
Phalaris,  is  writhing  in  that  machine  of  tortures  he  had 
contrived  for  others. 


006  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

"We  now  come  to  a  very  remarkable  passage:  it  is  the 
frenzied  language  of  disappointed  -wickedness. 

"17  June,  1771. 

"It  is  an  infinite  disappointment  to  me  that  the  Maga- 
zine does  not  grow  in  London  ;  I  thought  the  soil  had 
been  richer.  But  it  is  my  constant  fate  to  be  disappoint- 
ed in  everything  I  attempt ;  I  do  not  think  I  ever  had  a 
wish  that  was  gratified ;  and  never  dreaded  an  event  that 
did  not  come.  With  this  felicity  of  fate,  I  wonder  how 
the  devil  I  could  turn  projector.  I  am  now  sorry  that  I 
left  London ;  and  the  moment  that  I  have  money  enough 
to  carry  me  back  to  it,  I  shall  set  of£  I  mortally  detest 
o.u<l  abhor  this  place,  and  everybody  in  it.  Never  was 
there  a  city  where  there  was  so  much  pretension  to 
knowledge,  and  that  had  so  little  of  it.  The  solemn  fop- 
pery, and  the  gross  stupidity  of  the  Scottish  literati,  are 
perfectly  insupportable.  I  shall  drop  my  idea  of  a  Scots 
newspaper.  Xothing  will  do  in  this  country  that  has 
common  sense  in  it ;  only  cant,  hypocrisy,  and  super- 
stition will  flourish  here.  A  cicrse  on  the  country,  and 
aU  the  men,  women,  and  children  of  it!''' 

Again. — "  The  publication  is  too  good  for  the  country. 
There  are  very  fijw  men  of  taste  or  erudition  on  this  side 
of  the  Tweed.  Yet  every  idiot  one  meets  with  lavs 
claim  to  both.  Yet  the  success  of  the  Magazine  is  in 
reality  greater  than  we  could  expect,  considering  that  we 
have  every  clergyman  in  the  kingdom  to  oppose  it,  and 
that  the  magistracy  of  the  place  are  every  moment 
threatening  its  destruction." 

And,  therefore,  this  recreant  Scot  anathematizes  the 


LITERARY    HATRED.  207 

Scottish  people  for  not  applauding  blasphemy,  calumny, 
and  every  species  of  literary  criminality  !  Such  are  the 
monstrous  passions  that  swell  out  the  poisonous  breast 
of  genius,  deprived  of  every  moral  restraint ;  and  such 
was  the  demoniac  irritability  which  prompted  a  wish  in 
Collot  d'Herbois  to  set  fire  to  the  four  quarters  of  tho 
city  of  Lyons ;  while,  in  his  "  tender  mercies,"  the  ken- 
nels of  the  streets  were  running  with  the  blood  of  its 
inhabitants — remembering  still  that  the  Lyonese  had, 
when  he  was  a  miserable  actor,  hissed  him  oif  the  stage ! 
Stuart  curses  his  country,  and  retreats  to  London. 
Fallen,  but  not  abject ;  repulsed,  but  not  altered ;  de- 
graded, but  still  haughty.  No  change  of  place  could 
operate  any  in  his  heart.  He  was  born  in  literary  crime, 
and  he  perished  in  it.  It  was  now  "  The  English  Review  " 
was  instituted,  with  his  idol  Whitaker,  the  historian  of 
Manchester,  and  others.  He  says,  "  To  Whitaker  he  as- 
signs the  palm  of  history  in  preference  to  Hume  and 
Robertson."  I  have  heard  that  he  considered  himself 
higher  than  Whitaker,  and  ranked  himself  with  Montes- 
quieu. He  negotiated  for  Whitaker  and  himself  a  Doctor 
of  Laws'  degree  ;  and  they  were  now  in  the  titular  posses- 
sion of  all  the  fame  which  a  dozen  pieces  could  bestow ! 
In  "  The  English  Review  "  broke  forth  all  the  genius  of 
Stuart  in  an  unnatural  warfare  of  Scotchmen  in  London 
against  Scotchmen  at  Edinburgh.  "  The  bitter  herbs," 
which  seasoned  it  against  Blair,  Robertson,  Gibbon,  and 
the  ablest  authors  of  the  age,  at  first  provoked  the  public 
appetite,  which  afterwards  indignantly  rejected  the  pala- 
table garbage. 


208  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

But  to  proceed  with  our  Literary  CWs/>i>acy,  whLh 
was  conducted  by  Stuart  with  a  pertinacity  of  invention 
perhaps  not  to  be  paralleled  in  literary  history.  That 
the  peace  of  mind  of  such  an  industrious  author  as  Dr. 
Henry  was  for  a  considerable  time  destroyed  ;  that  the 
sale  of  a  work  on  which  Henry  had  expended  much  of 
his  fortune  and  his  life  was  stopped  ;  and  that,  when 
covered  with  obloquy  and  ridicule,  in  despair  he  left 
Edinburgh  for  London,  still  encountering  the  same  hos- 
tility ;  that  all  this  was  the  work  of  the  same  hand  per- 
haps was  never  even  known  to  its  victim.  The  multiplied 
forms  of  this  Proteus  of  the  ATalevoli  were  still  but  one 
devil;  fire  or  water,  or  a  bull  or  a  lion  ;  still  it  was  the 
same  Proteus,  the  same  Stuart. 

From  the  correspondence  before  me  I  am  enabled  to 
collect  the  commencement  and  the  end  of  this  literary 
conspiracy,  with  all  its  intermediate  links.  It  thus 
commences : — 

"25  Nov.  1773. 
""We  have  been  attacked  from  different  quarters,  and 
Dr.  Henry  in  particular  has  given  a  long  and  a  dull  de- 
fence of  his  sermon.  I  have  replied  to  it  with  a  degree 
of  spirit  altogether  unknown  in  this  country.  The  rev- 
erend historian  was  perfectly  astonished,  and  has  actually 
invited  the  Society  for  Propagating  Christian  Knowledge 
to  arm  in  his  cause  !  I  am  about  to  be  persecuted  by  the 
whole  clergy,  and  I  am  about  to  persecute  them  in  my 
turn.  They  are  hot  and  zealous ;  I  am  cool  and  dispas- 
sionate, like  a  determined  sceptic  ;  since  I  have  entered 


LITERARY    HATRED.  209 

the  lists,  I  must  fight ;  I  must  gain  the  victory,  or  perish 

like  a  man." 

"13  Dec.  1773. 

"  David  Hume  wants  to  review  Henry ;  but  that  task  is 
so  precious  that  I  will  undertake  it  myself.  Moses,  were 
he  to  ask  it  as  a  favour,  should  not  have  it ;  yea,  not 
even  the  man  after  God's  own  heart." 

"4  March,  1774. 

"  This  month  Henry  is  utterly  demolished ;  his  sale  is 
stopped,  many  of  his  copies  are  returned ;  and  his  old 
friends  have  forsaken  him  ;  pray,  in  what  state  is  he  in 
London  ?  Henry  has  delayed  his  London  journey ;  you 
eannot  easily  conceive  how  exceedingly  he  is  humbled.  * 

"  I  wish  I  could  transport  myself  to  London  to  review 
him  for  the  Monthly.  A  fire  there,  and  in  the  Critical, 
would  perfectly  annihilate  him.  Could  you  do  nothing 
in  the  latter  ?  To  the  former  I  suppose  David  Hume  has 
transcribed  the  criticism'  he  intended  for  us.  It  is 
precious,  and  would  divert  you.     I  keep  a  proof  of  it  in 

*  It  may  be  curious  to  present  Stuart's  idea  of  the  literary  talents 
of  Henry.  Henry's  unhappy  turn  for  humour,  and  a  style  little  ac- 
cordant with  historical  dignity,  lie  fairly  open  to  the  critic's  animad- 
version. But  the  research  and  application  of  the  writer,  for  that  day, 
were  considerable,  and  are  still  appreciated.  But  we  are  told  that 
"he  neither  furnishes  entertainment  nor  instruction.  Diffuse,  vulgar, 
and  ungrammatical,  he  strips  history  of  all  her  ornaments.  As  an 
antiquary,  he  wants  accuracy  and  knowledge ;  and,  as  an  historian,  he 
is  destitute  of  fire,  taste,  and  sentiment.  His  work  is  a  gazette,  in 
which  we  find  actions  and  events,  without  their  causes  ;  and  in  which 
we  meet  with  the  names,  without  the  characters  of  personages.  He 
has  amassed  all  the  refuse  and  lumber  of  the  times  he  would  record." 
Stuart  never  imagined  that  the  time  would  arrive  when  the  name  of 
Henry  would  be  familiar  to  English  readers,  and  by  many  that  of 
Stuart  would  not  be  recollected. 
14 


210  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

my  cabinet  for   the  amusement  of  friends.     This  great 
philosopher  begins  to  dote."  * 

Stuart  prepares  to  assail  Henry,  on  his  arrival  in 
London,  from  various  quarters — to  lower  the  value  of 
his  history  in  the  estimation  of  the  purchasers. 

"21  March,  1114. 
"  To-morrow  morning  Henry  sets  off  for  London,  with 
immense  hopes  of  selling  his  history.  I  wish  he  had 
delayed  till  our  last  review  of  him  had  reached  your 
city.  But  I  really  suppose  that  he  has  little  probability 
of  getting  any  gratuity.  The  trade  are  too  sharp  to 
give  precious  gold  for  perfect  nonsense.  I  wish  sin- 
cerely that  I  could  enter  Holborn  the  same  hour  with 
him.  He  should  have  a  repeated  fire  to  combat  with. 
I  entreat  that  you  may  be  so  kind  as  to  let  him  feel 
some  of  your  thunder.  I  shall  never  forget  the  favoui\ 
If  Whitaker  is  in  London,  he  could  give  a  blow.  Pater- 
son  will  give  him  a  knock.  Strike  by  all  means.  The 
wretch  will  tremble,  grow  pale,  and  return  with  a  con- 
sciousness of  his  debility.  I  entreat  I  may  hear  from 
you  a  day  or  two  after  you  have  seen  him.  He  will 
complain  grievously  of  me  to  Strahan  and  Rose.  I 
shall  send  you  a  paper  about  him — an  advertisement 
from  Parnassus,  in  the  manner  of  Boccalini." 

"March,   1774. 

"Dr.  Henry  has  by  this  time  reached  you.  I  think 
you  ought  to  pay  your  respects  to  him  in  the  Morning 

♦The  critique  on  Henry,  in  the  Monthly  Review,  was  written  by 
Hume — and,  because  the  philosopher  was  candid,  he  is  hero  said  to 
have  doted. 


LITERARY   HATRED.  211 

Vhronicle.  If  you  would  only  transcribe  his  jests,  it 
would  make  him  perfectly  ridiculous.  See,  for  example, 
what  he  says  of  St.  Dunstan.     A  word  to  the  wise." 

" March  27,   1774. 

"I  have  a  thousand  thanks  to  give  you  for  your  in- 
sertion of  the  paper  in  the  London  Chronicle,  and  for 
the  part  you  propose  to  act  in  regard  to  Henry.  I 
could  wish  that  you  knew  for  certain  his  being  in  Lon- 
don before  you  strike  the  first  blow.  An  inquiry  at 
Cadell's  will  give  this.  When  you  have  an  enemy  to 
attack,  I  shall  in  return  give  my  best  assistance,  and 
aim  at  him  a  mortal  blow,  and  rush  forward  to  his 
overthrow,  though  the  flames  of  hell  should  start  up  to 
oppose  me. 

"  It  pleases  me,  beyond  what  I  can  express,  that  Whit- 
aker  has  an  equal  contempt  for  Henry.  The  idiot  threat- 
ened, when  he  left  Edinburgh,  that  he  would  find  a 
method  to  manage  the  Reviews,  and  that  he  would 
oppose  their  panegyric  to  our  censure.  Hume  has  be- 
haved ill  in  the  affair,  and  I  am  preparing  to  chastise 
him.  You  may  expect  a  series  of  papers  in  the  Maga- 
zine, pointing  out  a  multitude  of  his  errors,  and  ascer- 
taining his  ignorance  of  English  history.  It  was  too 
much  for  my  temper  to  be  assailed  both  by  infidels  and 
believers.  My  pride  could  not  submit  to  it.  I  shall 
act  in  my  defence  with  a  spirit  which  it  seems  they  have 
not  expected." 

"  11  April,   1774. 

"I  received  with  infinite  pleasure  the  annunciation 
of  the  great  man  into  the  capital.      It  is  forcible  and 


212  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

excellent;  and  you  have  my  best  thanks  for  it.  You 
improve  amazingly.  The  poor  creature  will  be  stupi- 
fied  with  amazement.  Inclosed  is  a  paper  for  him.  Boc- 
calini  will  follow.  I  shall  fall  upon  a  method  to  let 
David  know  Henry's  transaction  about  his  review.  It 
is  mean  to  the  last  degree.  But  what  could  one  expect 
from  the  most  ignorant  and  the  most  contemptible  man 
alive  ?  Do  you  ever  see  Macfarlane  ?  He  owes  me  a 
favour  for  his  history  of  George  IIL,  and  would  give  a 
fire  for  the  packet.  The  idiot  is  to  be  Moderator  for 
the  ensuing  Assembly.  It  shall  not,  however,  be  with- 
out opposition. 

"  Would  the  paragraph  about  him  from  the  inclosed 
leaf  of  the  'Edinburgh  Review'  be  any  disgrace  to  the 
Morn  ing  Chroa  icle  ?  " 

'•20tt  May,  1774. 

"Boccalini  I  thought  of  transmitting:,  when  the  rev- 
erend  historian,  for  whose  use  it  was  intended,  made 
his  appearance  at  Edinburgh.  But  it  will  not  be  lost. 
He  shall  most  certainly  see  it.  David's  critique  was 
most  acceptable.  It  is  a  curious  specimen  in  one  view 
of  insolent  vanity,  and  in  another  of  contemptible  mean- 
ness. The  old  historian  begins  to  dote,  and  the  new 
one  was  never  out  of  dotage." 

"3  April  1775. 

"I  see  every  day  that  what  is  written  to  a  man's 
disparogement  is  never  forgot  nor  forgiven.  Poor  Henry 
is  on  the  point  of  death,  and  Ins  friends  declare  that  I 
have  killed  him.  I  received  the  information  as  a  compli- 
ment, and  begged  they  would  not  do  me  so  much  honour." 


UNDUE   SEVERITY   OF   CRITICISM.  213 

But  Henry  and  his  history  long  survived  Stuart  and 
his  critiques  /  and  Robertson,  Blair,  and  Kaimes,  with 
others  he  assailed,  have  all  taken  their  due  ranks  in 
public  esteem.  What  niche  does  Stuart  occupy  ?  His 
historical  works  possess  the  show,  without  the  solidity, 
of  research  ;  hardy  paradoxes,  and  an  artificial  style  of 
momentary  brilliancy,  are  none  of  the  lasting  materials 
of  history.  This  shadow  of  "  Montesquieu,"  for  he  con- 
ceived him  only  to  be  his  fit  rival,  derived  the  last 
consolations  of  life  from  an  obscure  corner  of  a  Burton 
ale-house — there,  in  rival  potations,  with  two  or  three 
other  disappointed  authors,  they  regaled  themselves  on 
ale  they  could  not  always  pay  for,  and  recorded  their  own 
literary  celebrity,  which  had  never  taken  place.  Some 
time  before  his  death,  his  asperity  was  almost  softened 
by  melancholy ;  with  a  broken  spirit,  he  reviewed  him- 
self; a  victim  to  that  unrighteous  ambition  which  sought 
to  build  up  its  greatness  with  the  ruins  of  his  fellow- 
countrymen;  prematurely  wasting  talents  which  might 
have  been  directed  to  literary  eminence.  And  Gilbert 
Stuart  died  as  he  had  lived,  a  victim  to  intemperance, 
physical  and  moral! 


TTNDTJE  SEVERITY  OF   CRITICISM. 


DR.    KEXRICBL SCOTT    OF   AiTWELL. 

"TTTE    have   witnessed    the    malignant   influence   of 

*  *      illiberal  criticism,  not  only  on  literary  men,  but 

over  literature  itself,  since  it  is  the  actual  cause  of  sup- 


214  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

pressing  works  which  lie  neglected,  though  completed 
"by  their  authors.  The  arts  of  literary  condemnation,  as 
they  may  be  practised  by  men  of  wit  and  arrogance,  are 
well  known;  and  it  is  much  less  difficult  than  it  is  crimi- 
nal, to  scare  the  modest  man  of  learning,  and  to  rack 
the  man  of  genius,  in  that  bright  vision  of  authorship 
sometimes  indulged  in  the  calm  of  their  studies — a  gener- 
ous emotion  to  inspire  a  generous  purpose !  With  sup- 
pressed indignation,  shrinking  from  the  press,  such  have 
condemned  themselves  to  a  Carthusian  silence ;  but  the 
public  will  gain  as  little  by  silent  authors  as  by  a  com- 
munity of  lazy  monks ;  or  a  choir  of  singers  who  insist 
they  have  lost  their  voice.  That  undue  severity  of 
criticism  which  diminishes  the  number  of  good  authors, 
is  a  greater  calamity  than  even  that  mawkish  panegyric 
which  may  invite  indifferent  ones ;  for  the  truth  is,  a 
bad  book  produces  no  great  evil  in  literature  ;  it  dies 
soon,  and  naturally;  and  the  feeble  birth  only  disap- 
points its  unlucky  parent,  with  a  score  of  idlers  who 
are  the  dupes  of  their  rage  after  novelty.  A  bad  book 
never  sells  unless  it  be  addressed  to  the  passions,  and,  in 
that  case,  the  severest  criticism  will  never  impede  its 
circulation;  malignity  and  curiosity  being  passions  so 
much  stronger  and  less  delicate  than  taste  or  truth. 

Anil  who  are  the  authors  marked  out  for  attack  ? 
Scarcely  one  of  the  populace  of  scribblers;  for  wit  will 
not  lose  one  silver  shaft  on  game  which,  struck,  no  one 
would  take  up.  It  must  level  at  the  Historian,  whose 
novel  researches  throw  a  light  in  the  depths  of  antiquity; 
at  the  Poet,  who,  addressing  himself  tu  the  imagination 


UNDUE   SEVERITY   OF   CRITICISM.  215 

perishes  if  that  sole  avenue  to  the  heart  be  closed  on 
him.  Such  are  those  who  receive  the  criticism  which 
has  sent  some  nervous  authors  to  their  graves,  and 
embittered  the  life  of  many  whose  talents  we  all  re- 
gard. * 

But  this  species  of  criticism,  though  ungenial  and  nip- 
ping at  first,  does  not  always  kill  the  tree  which  it  has 
frozen  over. 

In  the  calamity  before  us,  Time,  that  great  autocrat, 
who  in  its  tremendous  march  destroys  authors,  also  anni- 
hilates critics  ;  and  acting  in  this  instance  with  a  new 
kind  of  benevolence,  takes  up  some  who  have  been 
violently  thrown  down,  and  fixes  them  in  their  proper 
place;  and  daily  enfeebling  unjust  criticism,  has  restored 
an  injured  author  to  his  full  honours. 

It  is,  however,  lamentable  enough  that  authors  must 
participate  in  that  courage  which  faces  the  cannon's 
mouth,  or  cease  to  be  authors  ;  for  military  enterprise 
is  not  the  taste  of  modest,  retired,  and  timorous  char- 
acters.    The    late   Mr.    Cumberland   used   to   say    that 

*  So  sensible  was  even  the  calm  Newton  to  critical  attacks,  that 
"WTiiston  tells  us  he  lost  his  favour,  which  he  had  enjoyed  for  twenty 
years,  for  contradicting  Newton  in  his  old  age;  for  no  man  was  of  "a 
more  fearful  temper."  Winston  declares  that  he  would  not  have 
thought  proper  to  have  published  his  work  against  Newton's  •'  Chro- 
nology "  in  his  lifetime,  "because  I  knew  his  temper  so  well,  that  I 
should  have  expected  it  would  have  killed  him ;  as  Dr.  Bentley, 
Bishop  Stillingfleet's  chaplain,  told  me,  that  he  believed  Mr.  Locke's 
thorough  confutation  of  the  Bishop's  metaphysics  about  the  Trinity 
hastened  his  end."  Pope  writhed  in  his  chair  from  the  light  shafts 
which  Cibber  darted  on  him ;  yet  they  were  not  tipped  with  the 
poison  of  the  Java-tree.  Dr.  Hawkesworth  died  of  criticism — Singing- 
birds  cannot  live  in  a  storm. 


216  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

authors  must  not  be  thin-skinned,  but  shelled  like  the 

rhinoceros  ;  there  are,  however,  more  delicately  tempered 

animals  among  them,  new-born  lambs,  who  shudder  at  a 

touch,  and  die  under  a  pressure. 

As  for  those  great  authors  (though  the  greatest  shrink 

from  ridicule)  who  still  retain  public  favour,  they  must 

be  patient,  proud,  and  fearless — patient  of  that  obloquy' 

which  still  will  stain  their  honour  from  literary  echoers ; 

proud,  while  they  are  sensible  that  their  literary  offspring 

is  not 

Deformed,  unfinished,  sent  before  its  time 
Into  this  breathing  world,  scarce  half  made  up. 

And  fearless  of  all  critics,  when  they  recollect  the 
reply  of  Bentley  to  one  who  threatened  to  write  him 
down,  "that  no  author  was  ever  written  down  but  by 
himself." 

An  author  must  consider  himself  as  an  arrow  shot  into 
the  world;  his  impulse  must  be  stronger  than  the  cur- 
rent of  air  that  carries  him  on — else  he  fall ! 

The  character  I  had  proposed  to  illustrate  this  calamity 
was  the  caustic  Dr.  Kenrick,  who,  once  during  several 
years,  was,  in  his  "London  Review,"  one  of  the  great 
disturbers  of  literary  repose.  The  turn  of  his  criticism  ; 
the  airiness,  or  the  asperity  of  his  sarcasm;  the  arro- 
gance with  which  he  treated  some  of  our  great  authors, 
would  prove  very  amusing,  and  serve  to  display  a  cer- 
tain talent  of  criticism.  The  life  of  Kenrick,  too,  would 
have  afforded  some  wholesome  instruction  concerning  the 
morality  of  a  critic.  But  the  rich  materials  are  not  at 
hand!     He  was  a  man  of  talents,  who  ran  a  race  with 


UNDUE   SEVERITY   OF   CRITICISM.  217 

the  press;  could  criticise  all  the  genius  of  the  age  faster 
than  it  could  be  produced;  could  make  his  own  malig- 
nity look  like  wit,  and  turn  the  wit  of  others  into 
absurdity,  by  placing  it  topsy-turvy.  As  thus,  when  he 
attacked  "The  Traveller"  of  Goldsmith,  which  he  called 
"  a  flimsy  poem,"  he  discussed  the  subject  as  a  grave 
political  pamphlet,  condemning  the  whole  system,  as 
raised  on  false  principles.  "  The  Deserted  Village  "  was 
sneeringly  pronounced  to  be  "  pretty ;"  but  then  it  had 
"  neither  fancy,  dignity,  genius,  or  fire."  When  he 
reviewed  Johnson's  "Tour  to  the  Hebrides,"  he  decrees 
that  the  whole  book  was  written  "  by  one  who  had  seen 
but  little,"  and  therefore  could  not  be  very  interesting. 
His  virulent  attack  on  Johnson's  Shakspeare  may  be  pre- 
served for  its  total  want  of  literary  decency ;  and  his 
"Love  in  the  Suds,  a  Town  Eclogue,"  where  he  has 
placed  Garrick  with  an  infamous  character,  may  be  use- 
ful to  show  how  far  witty  malignity  will  advance  in  the 
violation  of  moral  decency.  He  libelled  all  the  genius  of 
the  age,  and  was  proud  of  doing  it.*  Johnson  and  Aken- 
side  preserved  a  stern  silence  :  but  poor  Goldsmith,  the 
child  of  Nature,  could  not  resist  attempting  to  execute 
martial  law,  by  caning  the  critic ;  for  which  being 
blamed,  he  published  a  defence  of  himself  in  the  papers. 

*  In  one  of  his  own  publications  he  quotes,  with  great  self-compla- 
cency, the  following  lines  on  himself: — 

"  The  wits  who  drink  water  and  suck  sugar-candy, 
Impute  the  strong  spirit  of  Kenrick  to  brandy: 
They  are  not  so  much  out;  the  matter  in  short  is, 
He  sips  aqua-vil'je  and  spits  aqux-fortis." 


218  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

I  shall  transcribe  his  feelings  on  Kenrick'a  excessive  and 
illiberal  criticism. 

"The  law  gives  us  no  protection  against  this  injury. 
The  insults  we  receive  before  the  public,  by  being  more 
open,  are  the  more  distressing;  by  treating  them  with 
silent  contempt,  we  do  not  pay  a  sufficient  deference  to 
the  opinion  of  the  world.  By  recurring  to  legal  red; 
we  too  often  expose  the  weakness  of  the  law,  which  only 
serves  to  increase  our  mortification  by  failing  to  relieve 
us.  In  short,  every  man  should  singly  consider  himself 
as  a  guardian  of  the  liberty  of  the  pr  ss,  and,  as  far  as 
his  influence  can  extend,  should  endeavour  to  prevent 
its  licentiousness  becoming  at  last  the  grave  of  its  free- 
dom."' * 

Here  then  is  another  calamity  arising  from  the  ca- 
lamity of  undue  severity  of  criticism,  which  authors 
bring  on  themselves  by  their  excessive  anxiety,  which 
throws  them  into  some  extremely  l-idiculous  attitudes ; 
and  surprisingly  influences  even  authors  of  good  sense 
and  temper.     Scott,  of  Amwell,  the  Quaker   and  Poet, 

*  Dr.  Kenrick's  character  and  career  is  thus  summed  up  in  the 
"Biographia  Dramatica:" — "  This  author,  with  singular  abilities,  was 
neither  happy  or  successful.  Few  persons  were  ever  less  respected 
by  the  world ;  still  fewer  have  created  so  many  enemies,  or  dropped 
•lie  grave  so  little  regreuei  by  their  con;em;>i>rarie3.  lie  was 
seldom  without  an  enemy  to  attack  or  defend  himself  from.'"  He  was 
the  son  of  a  London  ckizen,  and  is  said  to  have  served  an  apprenticeship 
to  a  brass-rule  maker.  One  of  his  best  known  literary  works  was  a 
comedy  called  Falstaff^sWtMing.  which  met  witli  considerable  su 
upon  the  stage,  although  its  author  ventured  on  the  difficult  task  of 
adopting  Shakespeare's  characters,  and  putting  new  words  into  the 
muuth  of  tlie  immortal  Sir  John  and  his  satellites. — Ed. 


UNDUE   SEVERITY  OF   CRITICISM.  219 

was,  doubtless,  a  modest  and  amiable  man,  for  Johnson 
declared  "  he  loved  him."  When  his  poems  were  col- 
lected, they  were  reviewed  in  the  "  Critical  Review"  very 
offensively  to  the  poet ;  for  the  critic,  alluding  to  the 
numerous  embellishments  of  the  volume,  observed  that 

"  There  is  a  profusion  of  ornaments  and  finery  about 
this  book  not  quite  suitable  to  the  plainness  and  simpli- 
city of  the  Barclean  system ;  but  Mr.  Scott  is  fond  of 
the  Muses,  and  wishes,  we  suppose,  like  Captain  Mac- 
heath,  to  see  his  ladies  well  dressed." 

Such  was  the  cold  affected  witticism  of  the  critic, 
whom  I  intimately  knew — and  I  believe  he  meant  little 
harm !  His  friends  imagined  even  that  this  was  the 
solitary  attempt  at  wit  he  had  ever  made  in  his  life ; 
for  after  a  lapse  of  years,  he  would  still  recur  to  it  as  an 
evidence  of  the  felicity  of  his  fancy,  and  the  keenness 
of  his  satire.  The  truth  is,  he  was  a  physician,  whose 
name  is  prefixed  as  the  editor  to  a  great  medical  com- 
pilation, and  who  never  pretended  that  he  had  any 
taste  for  poetry.  His  great  art  of  poetical  criticism  was 
always,  as  Pope  expresses  a  character,  "  to  dwell  in 
decencies;"  his  acumen,  to  detect  that  terrible  poetic 
crime  false  rhymes,  and  to  employ  indefinite  terms, 
which,  as  they  had  no  precise  meaning,  were  applicable 
to  all  things ;  to  commend,  occasionally,  a  passage  not 
always  the  most  exquisite ;  sometimes  to  hesitate,  while, 
with  delightful  candour,  he  seemed  to  give  up  his  opin- 
ion ;  to  hazard  sometimes  a  positive  condemnation  on 
parts  which  often  unluckily  proved  the  most  favourite 
with  the  poet  and  the  reader.     Such  was  this  poetical 


2£0  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

reviewer,  whom  no  one  disturbed  in  his  periodical  course, 
till  the  circumstance  of  a  plain  Quaker  becoming  a  poet, 
and  fluttering  in  the  finical  ornaments  of  his  book,  pro- 
voked him  from  that  calm  state  of  innocent  mediocrity, 
into  miserable  humour,  and  illiberal  criticism. 

The  eflfect,  however,  this  pert  criticism  had  on  poor 
Scott  was  indeed  a  calamity.  It  produced  an  incon- 
siderate "Letter  to  the  Critical  Reviewers."  Scott  was 
justly  offended  at  the  stigma  of  Quakerism,  applied  to 
the  author  of  a  literary  composition  ;  but  too  gravely 
accuses  the  critic  of  his  scurrilous  allusion  to  Macheath, 
as  comparing  him  to  a  highwayman;  he  seems,  how- 
ever, more  provoked  at  the  odd  account  of  his  poems ; 
he  says,  "  You  rank  all  my  poems  together  as  bad,  then 
discriminate  some  as  good,  and,  to  complete  all,  recom- 
mend the  volume  as  an  agreeable  and  amusing  collec- 
tion." Had  the  poet  been  personally  acquainted  with 
this  tantalizing  critic,  he  would  have  comprehended  the 
nature  of  the  criticism — and  certainly  would  never  have 
replied  to  it. 

The  critic,  employing  one  of  his  indefinite  terms,  had 
said  of"  Amwell,"  and  some  of  the  early  "Elegies,"  that 
"  they  had  their  share  of  poetical  merit ;"  he  does  not 
venture  to  assign  the  proportion  of  that  share,  but  "  the 
Amoebean  and  oriental  eclogues,  odes,  epistles,  &c,  now 
added,  are  of  a  much  weaker  feature,  and  many  of 
th< in  incorrect.''' 

Here  Scott  loses  all  his  dignity  as  a  Quaker  and  a 
poet — he  asks  what  the  critic  means  by  the  affected 
phrase  much  weaker  feature/   the   style,  he   says,  was 


UNDUE   SEVERITY"  OF   CRITICISM.  221 

designed  to  be  somewhat  less  elevated,  and  thus  ad- 
dresses the  critic : — 

"You  may,  however,  be  safely  defied  to  pronounce 
them,  with  truth,  deficient  either  in  strength  or  melody 
of  versification  !  They  were  designed  to  be,  like  Virgil's, 
descriptive  of  Nature,  simple  and  correct.  Had  you 
been  disposed  to  do  me  justice,  you  might  have  observed 
that  in  these  eclogues  I  had  drawn  from  the  great  pro- 
totype Nature,  much  imagery  that  had  escaped  the 
notice  of  all  my  predecessors.  You  might  also  have 
remarked  that  when  I  introduced  images  that  had  been 
already  introduced  by  others,  still  the  arrangement  or 
combination  of  those  images  was  my  own.  The  praise 
of  originality  you  might  at  least  have  allowed  me." 

As  for  their  incorrectness! — Scott  points  that  accusa- 
tion with  a  note  of  admiration,  adding,  "with  what- 
ever defects  my  works  may  be  chargeable,  the  last  is 
that  of  incorrectness." 

We  are  here  involuntarily  reminded  of  Sir  Fretful,  in 
The  Critic: — 

"  I  think  the  interest  rather  declines  in  the  fourth  act." 

"  Rises  !  you  mean,  my  dear  friend  ! " 

Perhaps  the  most  extraordinary  examples  of  the  irri- 
tation of  a  poet's  mind,  and  a  man  of  amiable  temper, 
are  those  parts  of  this  letter  in  which  the  author  quotes 
large  portions  of  his  poetry,  to  refute  the  degrading 
strictures  of  the  reviewer. 

This  was  a  fertile  principle,  admitting  of  very  copious 
extracts ;  but  the  ludicrous  attitude  is  that  of  an  Adonis 
inspecting  himself  at  his  mirror. 


922  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

That  provoking  see-saw  of  criticism,  which  our  learned 
physician  usually  adopted  in  his  critiques,  was  particu- 
larly tantalizing  to  the  poet  of  Amwell.  The  critic 
condemns,  in  the  gross,  a  whole  set  of  eclogues  ;  but 
immediately  asserts  of  one  of  them,  that  "  the  whole  of 
it  lias  great  poetical  merit,  and  paints  its  subject  in  the 
warmest  colours."  When  he  came  to  review  the  odes, 
he  discovers  that  "  he  does  not  meet  with  those  polished 
numbers,  nor  that  freedom  and  spirit,  which  that  species 
of  poetry  requires;"  and  quotes  half  a  stanza,  which  he 
declares  is  "  abrupt  and  insipid."  "  From  twenty-seven 
odes !"  exclaims  the  writhing  poet — "  are  the  whole  of 
my  lyric  productions  to  be  stigmatised  for  four  lines 
which  are  flatter  than  those  that  pi*eceded  them?"  But 
what  the  critic  could  not  be  aware  of,  the  poet  tells  us — 
he  designed  them  to  be  just  what  they  are.  "I  knew 
they  were  so  when  they  were  first  written,  but  they 
Mere  thought  sufficiently  elevated  for  the  place."  And 
then  he  enters  into  an  inquiry  what  the  critic  can  mean 
by  "polished  numbers,  freedom,  and  spirit."  The  pas- 
sage is  curious  : — 

"By  your  first  criticism,  polished  ?rumbers,  if  you 
mean  melodious  versification,  this  perhaps  the  general 
ear  will  not  deny  me.  If  you  mean  classical,  chaste 
diction,  free  from  tautologous  repetitions  of  the  same 
thoughts  in  different  expressions;  free  from  had  rhymes, 
unnecessary  epithets,  and  incongruous  metaphors,  I  be- 
lieve you  may  he  safely  challenged  to  produce  many 
instances  win  rein  I  have  tailed. 

"By  freedom^  your    second    criterion,   if  you  mean 


UNDUE   SEVERITY   OF   CRITICISM.  223 

daring  transition,  or  arbitrary  and  desultory  disposition 
of  ideas,  however  this  may  be  required  in  the  greater 
ode,  it  is  now,  I  believe,  for  the  first  time,  expected  in 
the  lesser  ode.  If  you  mean  that  careless,  diffuse  com- 
position, that  conversation-verse,  or  verse  loitering  into 
prose,  now  so  fashionable,  this  is  an  excellence  which  I 
am  not  very  ambitious  of  attaining.  But  if  you  mean 
strong,  concise,  yet  natural  easy  expression,  I  appre- 
hend the  general  judgment  will  decide  in  my  favour. 
To  the  general  ear,  and  the  general  judgment,  then,  do 
I  appeal  as  to  an  impartial  tribunal."  Here  several 
odes  are  transcribed.  "  By  spirit,  your  third  criticism, 
I  know  nothing  you  can  mean  but  enthusiasm ;  that 
which  transports  us  to  every  scene,  and  interests  us  in 
every  sentiment.  Poetry  without  this  cannot  subsist; 
every  species  demands  its  proportion,  from  the  greater 
ode,  of  which  it  is  the  principal  characteristic,  to  the 
lesser,  in  which  a  small  portion  of  it  only  has  hitherto 
been  thought  requisite.  My  productions,  I  apprehend, 
have  never  before  been  deemed  destitute  of  this  essen- 
tial constituent.  Whatever  I  have  wrote,  I  have  felt, 
and  I  believe  others  have  felt  it  also." 

On  "  the  Epistles,"  which  had  been  condemned  in  the 
gross,  suddenly  the  critic  turns  round  courteously  to 
the  bard,  declaring,  "they  are  written  in  an  easy  and 
familiar  style,  and  seem  to  flow  from  a  good  and  be- 
nevolent heart."  But  then  sneeringly  adds,  that  one  of 
them  being  entitled  "  An  Essay  on  Painting,  addressed 
to  a  young  Artist,  had  better  have  been  omitted,  because 
it  had  been  so  fully  treated  in  so  masterly  a  manner  by 


224  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

Mr.  Hayley."  This  was  letting  fall  a  spark  in  a  barrel 
of  gunpowder.  Scott  immediately  analyses  his  brother 
poet's  poem,  to  show  they  have  nothing  in  common; 
and  then  compares  those  similar  passages  the  subject 
naturally  produced,  to  show  that  "his  poem  does  not 
suffer  greatly  in  the  comparison."  "You  may,"  he 
adds,  after  giving  copious  extracts  from  both  poems, 
"  persist  in  saying  that  Mr.  Hayley's  are  the  best.  Your 
business  then  is  to  prove  it."  This,  indeed,  had  been  a 
very  hazardous  affair  for  our  medical  critic,  whose 
poetical  feelings  were  so  equable,  that  he  acknowledges 
"  Mr.  Scott's  poem  is  just  and  elegant,"  but  "  Mr. 
Hayley's  is  likewise  just  and  elegant;"  therefore,  if  one 
man  has  written  a  piece  "just  and  elegant,"  there  is  no 
need  of  another  on  the  same  subject  "just  and  elegant." 
To  such  an  extreme  point  of  egotism  was  a  modest 
and  respectable  author  most  cruelly  driven  by  the  cal- 
lous playfulness  of  a  poetical  critic,  who  himself  had  no 
sympathy  for  poetry  of  any  quality  or  any  species,  and 
whose  sole  art  consisted  in  turning  about  the  canting 
dictionary  of  criticism.  Had  Homer  been  a  mod<  ra 
candidate  for  poetical  honours,  from  him  Homer  had  not 
been  distinguished,  even  from  the  mediocrity  of  Scott  of 
Amwell,  whose  poetical  merits  are  not,  however,  slight. 
In  his  Amoebean  eclogues  he  may  be  distinguished  as 
the  poet  of  botanists. 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR   WITHOUT   JUDGMENT.     225 

A  VOLUMINOUS  AUTHOR  WITHOUT  JUDG- 
MENT. 

"TT"AST  erudition,  without  the  tact  of  good  sense,  in  a 
▼  voluminous  author,  what  a  calamity  !  for  to  such  a 
mind  no  subject  can  present  itself  on  which  he  is  un- 
prepared to  write,  and  none  at  the  same  time  on  which 
he  can  ever  write  reasonably.  The  name  and  the  works 
of  William  Prynne  have  often  come  under  the  eye  of 
the  reader ;  but  it  is  even  now  difficult  to  discover  his 
real  character;  for  Prynne  stood  so  completely  insulated 
amid  all  parties,  that  he  was  ridiculed  by  his  friends, 
and  execrated  by  his  enemies.  The  exuberance  of  his 
fertile  pen,  the  strangeness  and  the  manner  of  his  sub- 
jects, and  his  pertinacity  in  voluminous  publication,  are 
known,  and  are  nearly  unparalleled  in  literary  history. 

Could  the  man  himself  be  separated  from  the  author, 
Prynne  would  not  appear  ridiculous  ;  but  the  unlucky 
author   of  nearly   two   hundred   works,*   and   who,   as 

*  That  all  these  works  should  not  be  wanting  to  posterity,  Prynne 
deposited  the  complete  collection  in  the  library  of  Lincoln's-Inn,  about 
forty  volumes  in  folio  and  quarto.  Noy,  the  Attorney-General,  Prynne's 
great  adversary,  was  provoked  at  the  society's  acceptance  of  these 
ponderous  volumes,  and  promised  to  send  them  the  voluminous  la- 
bours of  Taylor  the  water-poet,  to  place  by  their  side  ;  he  judged,  as 
Wood  says,  that  "  Prynne's  books  were  worth  little  or  nothing ;  that 
his  proofs  were  no  arguments,  and  his  affirmations  no  testimonies." 
But  honest  Anthony,  in  spite  of  his  prejudices  against  Prynne,  con- 
fesses, that  though  "  by  the  generality  of  scholars  they  are  looked 
upon  to  be  rather  rhapsodical  and  confused  than  polite  or  concise,  yet, 
for  antiquaries,  critics,  and  sometimes  for  divines,  they  are  useful." 
Such  erudition  as  Prynne's  always  retains  its  value — the  author  who 
could  quote  a  hundred  authors  on  "  the  unlovelinesa  of  love-locks," 
15 


226  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

"Wood  quaintly  computes,  "  must  have  written  a  sheet 
every  day  of  his  life,  reckoning  from  the  time  that  he 
came  to  the  use  of  reason  and  the  state  of  man,"  has 
involved  his  life  in  his  authorship ;  the  greatness  of  his 
character  loses  itself  in  his  voluminous  works ;  and 
whatever  Prynne  may  have  been  in  his  own  age,  and 
remains  to  posterity,  he  was  fated  to  endure  all  the 
calamities  of  an  author  who  has  strained  learning  into 
absurdity,  and  abused  zealous  industry  by  chimerical 
speculation. 

Yet  his  activity,  and  the  firmness  and  intrepidity  of 
his  character  in  public  life,  were  as  ardent  as  they  were 
in  his  study — his  soul  was  Roman ;  and  Eachard  says, 
that  Charles  II.,  who  could  not  but  admire  his  earnest 
honesty,  his  copious  learning,  and  the  public  persecu- 
tions he  suffered,  and  the  ten  imprisonments  he  endured, 
inflicted  by  all  parties,  dignified  him  with  the  title  of 
"  the  Cato  of  the  Age ;"  and  one  of  his  own  parti 
facetiously  described  him  as  "  William  the  Conqueror," 
a  title  he  had  most  hardly  earned  by  his  inflexibly 
and  invincible  nature.  Twice  he  had  been  cropped  of 
his  ears;  for  at  the  first  time  the  executioner  having 
spared  the  two  fragments,  the  inhuman  judge  on  his 
second  trial  discovering  them  with  astonishment,  ordered 
them  to  be  most  unmercifully  cropped — then  he  was 
burned  on  his  cheek,  and  ruinously  fined  and  imprisoned 
in  a  remote  solitude,* — but  had  they  torn  him  limb  by 

will  always  make  a  good  literary  chest  of  drawers,  well  filled,  for 
those  who  can  make  hetter  use  of  their  contents  than  himself. 

*  Prynne  feems  to  have  considered  being  debarred  from  pen.  ink, 
end  books  as  an  act  more  barbarous  than  the  loss  of  his  ears.     See 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR   WITHOUT  JUDGMENT.     227 

flmb,  Prynne  had  been  in  his  mind  a  very  polypus, 
which,  cut  into  pieces,  still  loses  none  of  its  individuality. 

his  curious  book  of  "  A  New  Discovery  of  the  Prelate's  Tyranny;" 
it  is  a  complete  collection  of  everything-  relating  to  Prynne.  Bast  wick, 
and  Burton;  three  political  fanatics,  who  seem  impatiently  to  have 
courted  the  fate  of  Marsyas.  Prynne,  in  his  voluminous  argument, 
proving  the  illegality  of  the  sentences  ho  had  suffered,  in  his  ninth 
point  thus  gives  way  to  all  the  feelings  of  Martinus  Scriblerus:  — 
"  Point  9th,  that  the  prohibiting  of  me  pen,  ink,  paper,  and  books,  is 
against  law."  He  employs  an  argument  to  prove  that  the  abuse  of 
any  lawful  thing  never  takes  away  the  use  of  it ;  therefore  the  law 
does  not  deprive  gluttons  or  drunkards  of  r.eeessary  meat  and  drink ; 
this  analogy  he  applies  to  his  pen,  ink,  and  books,  of  which  they  could 
not  deprive  him,  though  they  might  punish  him  for  their  abuse.  He 
asserts  that  the  popish  prelates,  in  the  reign  of  Mary,  were  the  first 
who  invented  this  new  torture  of  depriving  a  scribbler  of  pen  and  ink. 
He  quotes  a  long  passage  from  Ovid's  Tristia,  to  prove  that,  though 
exiled  to  the  Isle  of  Pontus  for  his  wanton  books  of  love,  pen  and  ink 
were  not  denied  him  to  compose  new  poems ;  that  St.  John,  banished 
to  the  Isle  of  Patmos  by  the  persecuting  Domitian,  still  was  allowed 
pen  and  ink,  for  there  he  wrote  the  Revelation — and  he  proceeds  with 
similar  facts.  Prynne's  books  abound  with  uncommon  facts  on  com- 
mon topics,  for  he  had  no  discernment;  and  he  seems  to  have  written 
to  convince  himself,  and  not  the  public. 

But  to  show  the  extraordinary  perseverance  of  Prynne  in  his  love 
of  scribbling,  I  transcribe  the  following  title  of  one  of  his  extraor- 
dinary works.  He  published  "  Comfortable  Cordial  against  Discomfort- 
able  Fears  of  Imprisonment,  containing  some  Latin  verses,  sentences 
and  texts  of  Scripture,  written  by  Mr.  Wm.  Prynne  on  his  chamber-walls 
in  the  Tower  of  London  during  his  imprisonment  there ;  translated 
by  him  into  English  verse,"  1641.  Prynne  literally  verifies  Pope's 
description — 

"Is  there  who  lock'd  from  ink  and  paper,  scrawls 
With  desperate  charcoal  round  his  darken'd  walls  ?" 

We  have  also  a  catalogue  of  printed  books  written  by  Wm.  Prynne, 

of  Lincoln's-Inn,  Esq.,  in  these  classes — 

Before    \ 

During  v  his  imprisonment,  with  the  motto  Jucundi  acti  labores.     1643. 

Since      ) 


223  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

His  conduct  on  the  last  of  these  occasions,  when 
sentenced  to  be  stigmatised,  and  to  have  his  ears  cut 
c'ose,  must  be  noticed.  Turning  to  the  executioner,  he 
calmly  invited  him  to  do  his  duty — "  Come,  friend, 
come,  burn  me  !  cut  me  !  I  fear  not  !  I  have  learned 
to  fear  the  fire  of  hell,  and  not  what  man  can  do  unto 
me  ;  come,  scar  me  !  scar  me  !"'  In  Prynne  this  was  not 
ferocity,  but  heroism;  Bastwick  "was  intrepid  out  of 
spite,  and  Burton  from  fanaticism.  The  executioner 
had  been  urged  not  to  spare  his  victims,  and  lie  per- 
formed his  office  with  extraordinary  severity,  cruelly 
heating  his  iron  twice,  and  cutting  one  of  Prynne's  ears 
so  close,  as  to  take  away  a  piece  of  the  cheek.  Prynne 
stirred  not  in  the  torture;  and  when  it  was  done,  smiled, 
observing,  "  The  more  I  am  beaten  down,  the  more  I  am 
lift  up."  After  this  punishment,  in  going  to  the  Tower 
by  water,  he  composed  the  following  verses  on  the  two 
letters  branded  on  his  cheek,  S.  L.,  for  schismatical 
libeller,  but  which  Prynne  chose  to  translate  "  Stigmata 
Laudis,"  the  stigmas  of  his  enemy,  the  Archbishop 
Laud. 

Stigmata  maxillis  referens  insignia  Lacdis, 
Exultans  remco,  victims  grata  Deo. 

The  heroic  man,  who  could  endure  agony  and  insult, 
and  even  thus  commemorate  his  sufferings,  with  no 
anpoctical  conception,  almost  degrades  his  own  sub- 
limity when  the  poetaster  sets  our  teeth  on  edge  by  hi9 
verse. 

Bearing  Laud's  stamps  on  my  cheeks  I  retire 
Triumphing,  God's  sweet  sacrifice  by  fire. 


VOLUMINOUS  AUTIIOR  WITHOUT  JUDGMENT.     229 

The  triumph  of  this  unconquered  being  was,  indeed, 
signal.  History  scarcely  exhibits  so  Avonderful  a  reverse 
of  fortune,  and  so  strict  a  retribution,  as  occurred  at 
this  eventful  period.  lie  who  had  borne  from  the 
archbishop  and  the  lords  in  the  Star  Chamber  the  most 
virulent  invectives,  wishing  them  at  that  instant  seriously 
to  consider  that  some  who  sat  there  on  the  bench  might 
yet  stand  prisoners  at  the  bar,  and  need  the  favour  they 
now  denied,  at  length  saw  the  prediction  completely 
verified.  What  were  the  feelings  of  Laud,  when 
Prynne,  returning  from  his  prison  of  Mount  Orgueil  in 
triumph,  the  road  strewed  with  boughs,  amid  the  accla- 
mations of  the  people,  entered  the  apartment  in  the 
Tower  which  the  venerable  Laud  now  in  his  turn 
occupied.  The  unsparing  Puritan  sternly  performed 
the   office   of   rifling   his   papers,*   and   persecuted   the 

*  The  interesting  particulars  of  this  interview  have  been  preserved 
by  the  Archbishop  himself — and  it  is  curious  to  observe  how  Laud 
could  now  utter  the  same  tones  of  murmur  and  grief  to  which  Prynne 
himself  had  recently  given  way.  Studied  insult  in  these  cases  ac- 
companies power  in  the  hands  of  a  faction.  I  collect  the-e  particulars 
from  "  The  History  of  the  Troubles  and  Tryal  of  Archbishop  Laud," 
and  refer  to  Vicars's  "God  in  the  Mount,  or  a  Parliamentarie  Chroni- 
cle," p.  344,  for  the  Puritanic  triumphs. 

"My  implacable  enemy,  Mr.  Pryn,  was  picked  out  as  a  man  whose 
malice  might  be  trusted  to  make  the  search  upon  me.  and  he  did  it 
exactly.  The  manner  of  the  search  upon  me  was  thus :  Mr.  Pryn 
came  into  the  Tower  so  soon  as  the  gates  were  open — commanded  the 
Warder  to  open  my  door — he  came  into  my  chamber,  and  found  me  in 
bed — Mr.  Pryn  seeing  me  safe  in  bed,  falls  first  to  my  pockets  to  rifle 
them — it  was  expressed  in  the  warrant  that  he  should  search  my 
pockets.  Did  they  remember,  when  they  gave  this  warrant,  how 
odious  it  was  to  Parliaments,  and  some  of  themselves,  to  have  the 
pockets  of  men  searched  ?     I  rose,  got  my  gown  upon  my  shoulders, 


230  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

helpless  prelate  till  he  led  him  to  the  block.  Prynne,  to 
use  his  own  words,  for  he  could  he  eloquent  when  moved 
by  passion,  "had  struck  proud  Canterbury  to  the  heart; 
and  had  undermined  all  his  prelatical  designs  to  advance 


and  he  held  me  in  the  search  till  past  nine  in  the  morning  (he  had 
come  in  betimes  in  the  morning  in  the  month  of  May).  He  took  from 
me  twenty-one  bundles  of  papers  which  I  had  prepared  for  raj 
defence,  &c,  a  little  book  or  diary,  containing  all  the  occurrences  of 
my  life,  and  my  book  of  private  devotions ;  both  written  with  my  owi 
hand.  Nor  could  I  get  him  to  leave  this  last ;  he  must  needs  se<? 
what  passed  between  God  and  me.  The  last  place  he  rifled  was  a 
trunk  which  stood  by  my  bedside ;  in  that  he  found  nothing  but  about 
forty  pounds  in  money,  for  my  necessary  expenses,  which  he  meddled 
not  with,  and  a  bundle  of  some  gloves.  This  bundle  he  was  so  careful 
to  open,  as  that  he  caused  each  glove  to  be  looked  into ;  upon  this  1 
tendered  him  one  pair  of  the  gloves,  which  he  refusing,  I  told  him  he 
might  take  them,  and  fear  no  bribe,  for  he  had  already  done  me  all  the 
mischief  he  could,  and  I  asked  no  favour  of  him ;  so  he  thanked  me, 
took  the  gloves,  and  bound  up  my  papers,  and  went  his  way." — Prynne 
had  a  good  deal  of  cunning  in  his  character,  as  well  as  fortitude.  He 
had  all  the  subterfuges  and  quirks  which,  perhaps,  form  too  strong  a 
foature  in  the  character  of  "  an  utter  Barrister  of  Lincoln's  Inn."  Hi8 
great  artifice  was  secretly  printing  extracts  from  the  diary  of  Laud, 
and  placing  a  copy  in  the  hands  of  every  member  of  the  House,  which 
was  a  sudden  stroke  on  the  Archbishop,  when  at  the  bar,  that  at  the 
moment  overcame  him.  Once  when  Prynne  was  printing  one  of  his 
libels,  he  attempted  to  deny  being  the  author,  and  ran  to  the  printing- 
house  to  distribute  the  forms,  but  it  was  proved  he  had  corrected  the 
proof  and  the  revise.  Another  time,  when  he  had  written  a  libellous 
letter  to  the  Archbishop.  Nov,  the  Attorney-General,  sent  for  Prynne 
from  hi.s  prison,  and  demanded  of  him  whether  the  letter  was  of  his 
own  handwriting.  Prynne  said  he  must  see  and  read  the  letter 
before  he  could  determine ;  and  when  Noy  gave  it  to  him,  Prynne 
tore  it  to  pieces,  and  threw  the  fragments  out  of  the  window,  that  it 
might  not  be  brought  in  evidence  against  hits.  Noy  had  preserved  a 
copy,  but  thnt  did  not  avail  him,  as  Prynne  well  knew  that  the 
misdemeanour  was  in  the  letter  itself;  and  Noy  gave  up  the  prosecu- 
tion, as  there  was  now  no  remedy. 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR  WITHOUT   JUDGMENT.     231 

the  bishops'  pomp  and  power;"*  Prynnc  triumphed — 
hut,  even  this  austere  Puritan  soon  grieved  over  the 
calamities  he  had  contributed  to  inflict  on  the  nation  ; 
and,  with  a  humane  feeling,  he  once  wished,  that  "  when 
they  had  cut  off*  his  ears,  they  had  cut  off*  his  head." 
He  closed  his  political  existence  by  becoming  an  ad- 
vocate for  the  Restoration ;  but,  with  his  accustomed 
want  of  judgment  and  intemperate  zeal,  had  nearly 
injured  the  cause  by  his  premature  activity.  At  the 
Restoration  some  difficulty  occurred  to  dispose  of 
"  busie  Mr.  Pryn,"  as  Whitelocke  calls  him.  It  is  said 
he  wished  to  be  one  of  the  Barons  of  the  Exchequer, 
but  he  was  made  the  Keeper  of  the  Records  in  the 
Tower,  "  purposely  to  employ  his  head  from  scribbling 
against  the  state  and  bishops ;"  where  they  put  him  to 
clear  the  Augean  stable  of  our  national  antiquities,  and 
see  whether  they  could  weary  out  his  restless  vigour. 
Prynne  had,  indeed,  written  till  he  found  no  antagonist 
would  reply  ;  and  now  he  rioted  in  leafy  folios,  and 
proved  himself  to  be  one  of  the  greatest  paper-worms 
which  ever  crept  into  old  books  and  mouldy  records.f 

The  literary  character  of  Prynne  is  described  by  the 
happy  epithet  which   Anthony  Wood   applies   to   him, 

*  Breviate  of  the  Bishop's  intolerable  usurpations,  p.  35. 

f  "While  Keeper  of  the  Records,  he  set  all  the  great  energies  of  his 
nature  to  work  upon  the  national  archives.  The  result  appeared  in 
three  folio  volumes  of  the  greatest  value  to  the  historian.  They  were 
published  irregularly,  and  at  intervals  of  time — thus  the  second 
volume  was  issued  in  1665  ;  the  tirst  in  16GG  ;  and  the  third  in  1670. 
The  first  two  volumes  aro  of  the  utmost  rarity,  nearly  all  the  copies 
having  been  destroyed  in  the  great  fire  of  London. — Ed. 


232  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

"  Voluminous  Prynne."  His  great  characteristic  is  op- 
posed to  that  axiom  of  Hesiod  so  often  quoted,  that 
"  half  is  better  than  the  whole ;"  a  secret  which  the 
matter-of-fact  men  rarely  discover.  "Wanting  judgment, 
and  the  tact  of  good  sense,  these  detailers  have  no  power 
of  selection  from  their  stores,  to  make  one  prominent 
fact  represent  the  hundred  minuter  ones  that  may  follow 
it.  Voluminously  feeble,  they  imagine  expansion  is 
Btronger  than  compression  ;  and  know  not  to  generalise, 
while  they  only  can  deal  in  particulars.  Prynne's 
speeches  were  just  as  voluminous  as  his  writings  ;  always 
deficient  in  judgment,  and  abounding  in  knowledge — he 
was  always  wearying  others,  but  never  could  himself. 
He  once  made  a  speech  to  the  House,  to  persuade  them 
the  king's  concessions  were  sufficient  ground  for  a 
treaty ;  it  contains  a  complete  narrative  of  all  the 
transactions  between  the  king,  the  Honses,  and  the  army, 
from  the  beginning  of  the  parliament ;  it  takes  up  140 
octavo  pages,  and  kept  the  house  so  long  together,  that 
the  debates  lasted  from  Monday  morning  till  Tuesday 
morning  ! 

Prynne's  literary  character  may  be  illustrated  by  his 
singular  book,  "  Ilistriomastix," — where  we  observe  how 
an  author's  exuberant  learning,  like  corn  heaped  in  a 
granary,  grow-;  rank  and  musty,  by  a  want  of  power  to 
ventilate  and  stir  about  the  heavy  mass. 

This  paper-worm  may  first  be  viewed  in  his  study,  as 
painted  by  the  picturesque  Anthony  "Wood;  an  artist 
in  the  Flemish  school : — 

"His  custom,  when  he  studied,  was  to  put  on  a  long 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR  WITIIOUT   JUDGMENT.     233 

quilted  cap,  which  came  an  inch  over  his  eyes,  serving 
as  an  umbrella  to  defend  them  from  too  much  light,  and 
seldom  eating  any  d 'i inter,  would  be  every  three  hours 
maunching  a  roll  of  bread,  and  now  and  then  refresh  his 
exhausted  spirits  with  ale  brought  to  him  by  his 
servant;"  a  custom  to  which  Butler  alludes, 

Thou  that  with  ale,  or  viler  liquors, 
Didst  inspire  Withers,  Prynne,  aui  Vicars, 
And  force  them,  though  it  were  in  spite 
Of  nature,  aud  their  stars,  to  write. 

The  "  Histriomastix,  the  Player's  Scourge,  or  Actor's 
Tragedie,"  is  a  ponderous  quarto,  ascending  to  about 
1100  pages  ;  a  Puritan's  invective  against  plays  and 
players,  accusing  them  of  every  kind  of  crime,  including 
libels  against  Church  and  State  ;*  but  it  is  more  remark- 
able for  the  incalculable  quotations  and  references 
foaming  over  the  margins.  Prynne  scarcely  ventures  on 
the  most  trivial  opinion,  without  calling  to  his  aid 
whatever  had  been  said  in  all  nations  and  in  all  ages ; 
and  Cicero,  and  Master  Stubbs,  Petrarch  and  Minutius 
Felix,  Isaiah  and  Froissart's  Chronicle,  oddly  associate 
in  the  ravings  of  erudition.  Who,  indeed,  but  the 
author  "who  seldom  dined,"  could  have  quoted  perhaps 
a  thousand  writers  in  one  volume?  f     A  wit  of  the  times 

*  Hume,  in  his  Ilistory,  has  given  some  account  of  this  enormous 
quarto;  to  which  I  refer  the  reader,  vol.  vi.  chap.  lii. 

f  Milton  admirably  characterises  Prynne's  absurd  learning,  as  well 
as  his  character,  in  his  treatise  on  "The  likeliest  means  to  remove 
hirelings  out  of  the  Church,"  as  "a  late  hot  querist  for  tythes,  whom 
ye  may  know  by  his  wits  li,in>j  ever  beside  him  in  the  margin,  to  be  ever 
beside  his  wits  in  the  text.  A  fierce  Reformer  once;  now  rankled  with 
a  contrary  heat." 


934  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

remarked  of  this  Hdluo  Uhrorum,  that  "Nature  makes 
ever  the  dullesl  beasts  most  laborious,  and  the  greatest 
feeders;"  and  Prynne  has  been  reproached  with  a  weak 
digestion,  for  "  returning  things  unaltered,  which  is  a 
symptom  of  a  feeble  stomach." 

"When  we  examine  this  volume,  often  alluded  to,  the 
birth  of  the  monster  seems  prodigious  and  mysterious; 
it  combines  two  opposite  qualities;  it  is  so  elaborate  in 
its  researches  among  the  thousand  authors  quoted,  that 
these  required  years  to  accumulate,  and  yet  the  matter 
is  often  temporary,  and  levelled  at  fugitive  events  and 
particular  persons;  thus  the  very  formation  of  this 
mighty  volume  seems  paradoxical.  The  secret  history 
of  this  book  is  as  extraordinary  as  the  book  itself,  and  is 
a  remarkable  evidence  how,  in  a  work  of  immense 
erudition,  the  arts  of  a  wily  sage  involved  himself,  and 
whoever  was  concerned  hi  his  book,  in  total  ruin.  The 
author  was  pilloried,  fined,  and  imprisoned;  his  publisher 
condemned  in  the  penalty  of  five  hundred  pounds,  and 
barred  for  ever  from  printing  and  selling  books,  and  the 
licenser  removed  and  punished.  Such  was  the  fatality 
attending  the  book  of  a  man  whose  literary  voracity 
produced  one  of  the  most  tremendous  indigestions,  in  a 
malady  of  writing. 

It  was  on  examining  Prynne's  trial  I  discovered  the 
secret  history  of  the  "  Ilistriomastix."  Prynne  was  seven 
years  in  writing  this  work,  and,  what  is  almost  incredible, 
it  was  near  four  years  passing  through  the  press.  During 
that  interval  the  eternal  scribbler  was  daily  gorging 
himself   with    voluminous  food,  and  daily  fattening  his 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR  WITHOUT   JUDGMENT.     9'o~) 

eooped-up  capon.  Tlie  temporary  sedition  and  libels 
were  the  gradual  Mosaic  inlayings  through  this  shapeless 
mass. 

It  appears  that  the  volume  of  1100  quarto  pages  origi- 
nally consisted  of  little  more  than  a  quire  of  paper ;  but 
Prynne  found  insuperable  difficulties  in  procuring  a 
licenser,  even  for  this  infant  Hercules.  Dr.  Goode  de- 
posed that — 

"About  eight  years  ago  Mr.  Prynne  brought  to  him  a 
quire  of  paper  to  license,  which  he  refused  ;  and  he  recol- 
lected the  circumstance  by  having  held  an  argument 
with  Prynne  on  his  severe  reprehension  on  the  unlawful- 
ness of  a  man  to  put  on  women's  ajiparel,  which,  the 
good-humoured  doctor  asserted  was  not  always  unlaw- 
ful ;  for  suppose  Mr.  Prynne  yourself,  as  a  Christian,  was 
persecuted  by  pagans,  think  you  not  if  you  disguised 
yourself  in  your  maid's  apparel,  you  did  well  ?  Prynne 
sternly  answered  that  he  thought  himself  bound  rather 
to  yield  to  death  than  to  do  so." 

Another  licenser,  Dr.  Harris,  deposed,  that  about  seven 
years  ago — 

"  Mr.  Prynne  came  to  him  to  license  a  treatise  concern- 
ing stage-plays  ;  but  he  would  not  allow  of  the  same  ;" — 
and  adds,  "  So  this  man  did  deliver  this  book  when  it 
was  young  and  tender,  and  would  have  had  it  then 
printed ;  but  it  is  since  grown  seven  times  bigger,  and 
seven  times  worse." 

Prynne  not  being  able  to  procure  these  licensers,  had 
recourse  to  another,  Buckner,  chaplain  to  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury.     It  was  usual  for  the  licenser  to 


230  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

examine  the  MS.  before  it  went  to  the  press;  but  Prynne 
either  tampered  with  Buckner,  or  so  confused  his  intellects 
by  keeping  his  multifarious  volume  in  the  press  for  four 
years  ;  and  sometimes,  I  suspect,  by  numbering  folios  for 
pages,  as  appears  in  the  work,  that  the  examination  of  the 
licenser  gradually  relaxed ;  and  he  declares  in  his  defence 
that  he  had  only  licensed  part  of  it.  The  bookseller, 
Sparks,  was  indeed  a  noted  publisher  of  what  was  then 
called  "  Unlawful  and  unlicensed  books ;"  and  he  had  de- 
clared that  it  was  "  an  excellent  book,  which  would  be 
called  in,  and  then  sell  well."  He  confesses  the  book  had 
been  more  than  three  years  in  the  press,  and  had  cost 
him  three  hundred  pounds. 

The  speech  of  Noy,  the  Attorney-General,  conveys 
some  notion  of  the  work  itself;  sufficiently  curious  as 
giving  the  feelings  of  those  times  against  the  Puritans. 

"  Who  he  means  by  his  modern  innovators  in  the 
church,  andby  cringing  and  ducking  to  altars,  a  fit  term 
to  bestow  on  the  church  ;  he  learned  it  of  the  canters, 
being  used  among  them.  The  musick  in  the  church,  the 
charitable  term  he  giveth  it,  is  not  to  be  a  noise  of  men, 
but  rather  a  bleating  of  brute  beasts ;  choristers  bellow 
the  tenor,  as  it  were  oxen ;  bark  a  counterpoint  as  a  ken- 
nel of  dogs ;  roar  out  a  treble  like  a  sort  of  bulls  ;  grunt 
out  a  bass,  as  it  were  a  number  of  hogs.  Bishops  he 
calls  the  silk  and  satin  divines j  says  Christ  was  a  Purl- 
tan,  in  his  Index,  lie  falleth  on  those  things  that  have 
not  relation  to  stage-plays,  musick  in  the  church,  dancing, 
new-years'  gifts,  «fcc, — then  upon  altars,  images,  hair  of 
men  and  women,  bishops  and  bonfires.     Cards  and  tables 


VOLUMINOUS   AUTHOR   WITHOUT   JUDGMENT.     937 

do  offend  him,  and  perukes  do  fall  within  the  compass  of 
his  theme.  His  end  is  to  persuade  the  people  that  we  are 
returning  back  again  to  paganism,  and  to  persuade  them  to 
go  and  serve  God  in  another  country,  as  many  are  gone 
already,  and  set  up  new  laws  and  fancies  among  them- 
selves.    Consider  what  may  come  of  it !" 

The  decision  of  the  Lords  of  the  Star  Chamber  was 
dictated  by  passion  as  much  as  justice.  Its  severity  ex- 
ceeded the  crime  of  having  produced  an  unreadable  vol- 
ume of  indigested  erudition ;  and  the  learned  scribbler 
was  too  hardly  used,  scai'cely  escaping  with  life.  Lord 
Cottington,  amazed  at  the  mighty  volume,  too  bluntly 
affirmed  that  Prynne  did  not  write  this  book  alone  ;  "he 
either  assisted  the  devil,  or  was  assisted  by  the  devil." 
But  secretary  Cooke  delivered  a  sensible  and  temperate 
speech;  remarking  on  all  its  false  erudition  that, 

"By  this  vast  book  of  Mr.  Prynne's,  it  appeareth  that 
he  hath  read  more  than  he  hath  studied,  and  studied 
more  than  he  hath  considered.  He  calleth  his  book 
'Histriomastix;'  but  therein  he  showeth  himself  like  un- 
to Ajax  Antln-opomastix,  as  the  Grecians  called  him,  the 
scourge  of  all  mankind,  that  is,  the  whipper  and  the  whip." 

Such  is  the  history  of  a  man  wdiose  greatness  of  char- 
acter was  clouded  over  and  lost  in  a  fatal  passion  for 
scribbling;  such  is  the  history  of  a  voluminous  author 
"whose  genius  was  such  that  he  could  write  a  folio  much 
easier  than  a  page;  and  "seldom  dined  "  that  he  might 
quote  "squadrons  of  authorities."  * 

*  The  very  expression  Prynne  himself  uses,  see  p.  GG8  of  the  ITis- 
triomastix ;  where  having  gone  through  "  three  squadrons,"  lie  com- 


233  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 


GENIUS    AND   ERUDITION    THE   VICTIMS    OF 
IMMODERATE   VANITY. 

t  I  ^IIE  name  of  Toland  is  more  familiar  than  his  charac- 
ter,  yet  his  literary  portrait  has  great  singularity;  he 
must  be  classed  among  the  "  Authors  by  Profession,"  an 
honour  secured  by  near  fifty  publications  ;  and  we  shall 
discover  that  he  aimed  to  combine  with  the  literary 
character  one  peculiarly  his  own.*  With  higher  talents 
and  more  learning  than  have  been  conceded  to  him, 
there  ran  in  his  mind  an  original  vein  of  thinking.  Yet 
his  whole  life  exhibits  in  how  small  a  degree  great  intel- 
lectual powers,  when  scattered   through  all  the  forms 

mences  a  fresh  chapter  thus :  "  The  fourth  squadron  of  authorities  is 
the  venerable  troope  of  70  several  renowned  ancient  fathers  ;"  and  he 
throws  in  more  than  he  promised,  all  which  are  quoted  volume  and 
page,  as  so  many  "  play-confounding  arguments."  He  has  quoted 
perhaps  from  three  to  four  hundred  authors  on  a  single  point. 

*  Toland  was  born  in  Ireland,  in  1669.  of  Roman  Catholic  parents, 
but  became  a  zealous  opponent  of  that  faith  before  he  was  sixteen; 
after  which  he  finished  his  education  at  Glasgow  and  Edinburgh  ;  he 
retired  to  study  at  Leyden,  where  he  formed  the  acquaintance  of 
aitz  and  other  learned  men.  His  first  book,  published  in  1696, 
and  entitled  "Christianity  not  Mysterious,"  was  met  by  the  strongest 
denunciation  from  the  pulpit,  was  "  presented"  by  the  grand  jury  of 
Middlesex,  and  ordered  to  be  burnt  by  the  common  hangman  by  the 
Parliament  of  Ireland,  ne  was  henceforth  driven  for  employ  to 
literature;  and  in  1699  was  engaged  by  the  Duke  of  Newcastle  to 
edit  the  '-Memoirs  of  Denzil,  Lord  II  I  a;"  and  afterwards  by  the 
Earl  of  Oxford  on  a  new  edition  of  Harrington's  '-Oceana''  He  then 
•d  the  Courts  of  Berlin  and  Hanover.  He  published  many  works 
on  politics  and  religion,  the  laiter  all  remarkable  for  their  deistical 
tendencies,  and  died  in  March,  LT^J,  at  the  age  of  53. — Eu. 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY.  239 

■which  Vanity  suggests,  will  contribute  to  an  author's 
social  comforts,  or  raise  him  in  public  esteQm.  Toland 
was  fruitful  in  his  productions,  and  still  more  so  in  his 
projects ;  yet  it  is  mortifying  to  estimate  the  result  of 
all  the  intense  activity  of  the  life  of  an  author  of 
genius,  which  terminates  in  being  placed  among  these 
Calamities. 

Toland's  birth  was  probably  illegitimate;  a  circum- 
stance which  influenced  the  formation  of  his  character. 
Baptised  in  ridicule,  he  had  nearly  fallen  a  victim  to  Mr. 
Shandy's  system  of  Christian  names,  for  he  bore  the 
strange  ones  of  Janus  Junius,  which,  when  the  school- 
roll  was  called  over  every  morning,  afforded  perpetual 
merriment,  till  the  master  blessed  him  with  plain  John, 
which  the  boy  adopted,  and  lived  in  quiet.  I  must  say 
something  on  the  names  themselves,  perhaps  as  ridicu- 
lous! May  they  not  have  influenced  the  character  of 
Toland,  since  they  certainly  describe  it  ?  He  had  all 
the  shiftings  of  the  double-faced  Janus,  and  the  revolu- 
tionary politics  of  the  ancient  Junius.  His  godfathers 
sent  him  into  the  world  in  cruel  mockery,  thus  to  re- 
mind their  Irish  boy  of  the  fortunes  that  await  the  des- 
perately bold  :  nor  did  Toland  forget  the  strong-marked 
designations ;  for  to  his  most  objectionable  work,  the 
Latin  tract  entitled  Pantheisticon,  descriptive  of  what 
some  have  considered  as  an  atheistical  society,  he  sub- 
scribes these  appropriate  names,  which  at  the  time  were 
imagined  to  be  fictitious. 

Toland  ran  away  from  school  and  Popery.  When  in 
after-life  he  was  reproached  with  native  obscurity,  he 


240  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

ostentatiously  produced  a  testimonial  of  his  birth  and 
family,  hatched  up  at  a  convent  of  Irish  Franciscans  in 
Germany,  where  the  good  Fathers  subscribed,  with  their 
ink  tinged  with  then*  Rhenish,  to  his  most  ancient 
descent,  referring  to  the  Irish  history  !  which  they  con- 
sidered as  a  parish  register,  fit  for  the  suspected  son  of 
an  Irish  Priest ! 

Toland,  from  early  life,  was  therefore  dependent  on 
patrons ;  but  illegitimate  birth  creates  strong  and  deter- 
mined characters,  and  Toland  had  all  the  force  and 
originality  of  self-independence.  He  was  a  seed  thrown 
by  chance,  to  grow  of  itself  wherever  it  falls. 

This  child  of  fortune  studied  at  four  Universities ;  at 
Glasgow,  Edinburgh,  and  Leyden;  from  the  latter  he 
passed  to  Oxford,  and,  in  the  Bodleian  Library,  collected 
the  materials  for  his  after-studies. 

He  loved  study,  and  even  at  a  later  period  declares 
that  "  no  employment  or  condition  of  life  shall  make  me 
disrelish  the  lasting  entertainment  of  books."  In  his 
"  Description  of  Epsom,"  he  observes  that  the  taste  for 
retirement,  reading,  and  contemplation,  promotes  the 
true  relish  for  select  company,  and  says, 

"  Thus  I  remove  at  pleasure,  as  I  grow  weary  of  the 
country  or  the  town,  as  I  avoid  a  crowd  or  seek  com- 
pany.— Here,  then,  let  me  have  books  and  bread  enough 
without  dependence;  a  bottle  of  hermitage  and  a  plate 
of  olives  for  a  select  friend ;  with  an  early  rose  to  pre- 
sent a  young  lady  as  an  emblem  of  discretion  no  less 
than  of  beauty." 

At  Oxford   appeared  that  predilection  for  paradoxes 


THE    VICTIMS    OP    VANITY.  241 

and  over-curious  speculations,  which  formed  afterwards 
the  marking  features  of  his  literary  character.  He  has 
been  unjustly  contemned  as  a  sciolist;  he  was  the  corre- 
spondent of  Leibnitz,  Le  Clerc,  and  Bayle,  and  was  a 
learned  author  when  scarcely  a  man.  He  first  published 
a  Dissertation  on  the  strange  tragical  death  of  Regulus, 
and  proved  it  a  Roman  legend.  A  greater  paradox 
might  have  been  his  projected  speculation  on  Job,  to  de- 
monstrate that  only  the  dialogue  was  genuine ;  the  rest 
being  the  work  of  some  idle  Rabbin,  who  had  invented 
a  monstrous  story  to  account  for  the  extraordinary 
afflictions  of  that  model  of  a  divine  mind.  Speculations 
of  so  much  learning  and  ingenuity  are  uncommon  in  a 
young  man ;  but  Toland  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  value 
his  own  merits  before  those  who  did  not  care  to  hear  of 
them. 

Hardy  vanity  was  to  recompense  him,  perhaps  he 
thought,  for  that  want  of  fortune  and  connexions,  which 
raised  duller  spirits  above  him.  Yain,  loquacious,  in- 
considerate, and  daring,  he  assumed  the  dictatorship  of 
a  coffee-house,  and  obtained  easy  conquests,  which  he 
mistook  for  glorious  ones,  over  the  graver  fellows,  who 
had  for  many  a  year  awfully  petrified  their  own  colleges. 
He  gave  more  violent  offence  by  his  new  opinions  on 
religion.  An  anonymous  person  addressed  two  letters 
to  this  new  Heresiarch,  solemn  and  monitory.*  Toland's 
answer  is  as  honourable  as  that  of  his  monitor's.  This 
passage  is  forcibly  conceived : — 

*  These  letters  will  interest  every  religious  person  ;   they  may  be 
found  in  Toland's  posthumous  works,  vol.  ii.  p.  295. 
16 


242  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

"To  what  purpose  should  I  study  here  or  elsewhere, 
were  I  an  atheist  or  deist,  for  one  of  the  two  you  take 
me  to  be?  "What  a  condition  to  mention  virtue,  if  I 
believed  there  was  no  God,  or  one  so  impotent  that 
could  not,  or  so  malicious  that  would  not,  reveal  him- 
self! Nay,  though  I  granted  a  Deity,  yet,  if  nothing  of 
me  subsisted  after  death,  what  laws  could  bind,  what 
incentives  could  move  me  to  common  honesty  '?  Anni- 
hilation would  be  a  sanctuary  for  all  my  sins,  and  put  an 
end  to  my  crimes  with  myself.  Believe  me  I  am  not  so 
indifferent  to  the  evils  of  the  present  life,  but,  without  the 
expectation  of  a  better,  I  should  soon  suspend  the  mechan- 
ism of  my  body,  and  resolve  into  inconscious  atoms." 

This  early  moment  of  his  life  proved  to  be  its  crisis, 
and  the  first  step  he  took  decided  his  after-pn  s 
His  first  great  work  of  "  Christianity  not  Mysterious," 
produced  immense  consequences.  Toland  persevered  in 
denying  that  it  was  designed  as  any  attack  on  Christ  i- 
anitv,  but  only  on  those  subtractions,  additions,  and 
other  alterations,  which  have  corrupted  that  pure 
institution.  The  work,  at  least,  like  its  title,  is  "Mys- 
terious." *     Toland  passed  over  to  Ireland,  but  his  book 

*  Toland  pretends  to  prove  that  "  there  is  nothing  in  the  Christian 
Religion,  not  only  which  is  contrary  to  reason,  but  even  which  is 
above  it."  He  made  use  of  some  arguments  (says  Le  Gere)  that 
were  drawn  from  Locke's  Treatise  on  the  Human  Understanding.  I 
have  seen  in  MS.  a  finished  treatise  by  Locke  on  Religion,  add 
to  Lady  Shaftesbury;  Locke  Laves  it  as  a  translation  from  the  French. 
I  regret  my  account  is  so  imperfect;  but  the  possessor  may,  perhaps, 
be  induced  to  give  it  to  the  public.  The  French  philosophers  have 
drawn  their  first  waters  from  English  authors;  and  Toland,  Tindalc, 
and  Woolston,  with  Shaftesbury,  Bolingbroke,  and  Locke,  were  among 
their  earliest  acquisitions. 


TIIE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY.  243 

having  got  there  before  him,  the  author  beheld  himself 
anathematized;  the  pulpits  thundered,  and  it  was  dan- 
gerous to  be  seen  conversing  with  him.  A  jury  who 
confessed  they  could  not  comprehend  a  page  of  his  book, 
condemned  it  to  be  burned.  Toland  now  felt  a  tender- 
ness for  his  person ;  and  the  humane  Molyneux,  the 
friend  of  Locke,  while  he  censures  the  imprudent  vanity 
of  our  author,  gladly  witnessed  the  flight  of  "the  poor 
gentleman."  But  South,  indignant  at  our  English 
moderation  in  his  own  controversy  with  Sherlock  on 
some  doctrinal  points  of  the  Trinity,  congratulates  the 
Archbishop  of  Dublin  on  the  Irish  persecution ;  and 
equally  witty  and  intolerant,  he  writes  on  Toland, 
"  Your  Parliament  presently  sent  him  packing,  and  with- 
out the  help  of  a  fagot,  soon  made  the  kingdom  too  hot 
for  him." 

Toland  was  accused  of  an  intention  to  found  a  sect,  as 
South  calls  them,  of  "  Mahometan-Christians."  Many 
were  stigmatised  as  Tolanclists  /  but  the  disciples  of  a 
man  who  never  procured  for  their  prophet  a  bit  of  dinner 
or  a  new  wig,  for  he  was  frequently  wanting  both,  were 
not  to  be  feared  as  enthusiasts.  The  persecution  from 
the  church  only  rankled  in  the  breast  of  Toland,  and 
excited  unextinguishable  revenge. 

He  now  breathed  awhile  from  the  bonfire  of  theology ; 
and  our  Janus  turned  his  political  face.  He  edited 
Milton's  voluminous  politics,  and  Harrington's  fantasti- 
cal "  Oceana,"  and,  as  his  "  Christianity  not  Mysterious" 
had  stamped  his  religion  with  something  worse  than 
heresy,  so  in    politics   he  was  branded    as  a   Common- 


244  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

wealth's-man.  Toland  had  evidently  strong  nerves  ;  for 
him  opposition  produced  controversy,  which  he  loved, 
and  controversy  produced  books,  by  which  he  lived. 

But  let  it  not  be  imagined  that  Toland  affected  to  be 
considered  as  no  Christian,  or  avowed  himself  as  a 
Republican.  "  Civil  and  religious  toleration"  (he  says) 
"  have  been  the  two  main  objects  of  all  my  writings. 
He  declares  himself  to  be  only  a  primitive  Christian,  and 
a  pure  Whig.  But  an  author  must  not  be  permitted  to 
understand  himself  so  much  more  clearly  than  he  has 
enabled  his  readers  to  do.  Uis  mysterious  conduct  may 
be  detected  in  his  want  of  moral  integrity. 

He  had  the  art  of  explaining  away  his  own  words,  as" 
in  his  first  controversy  about  the  word  mystery  in 
religion,  and  he  exults  in  his  artifice  ;  for,  in  a  letter, 
where  he  is  soliciting  the  minister  for  employment,  he 
says  : — "  The  church  is  much  exasperated  against  me  ;  yet 
as  that  is  the  heaviest  article,  so  it  is  undoubtedly  the 
easiest  conquered,  and  I  know  the  infallible  method  of 
doing  it.n  And,  in  a  letter  to  the  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, he  promises  to  reform  his  religion  to  that  prelate's 
liking  !  lie  took  the  sacrament  as  an  opening  fur  the 
negotiation. 

"What  can  be  more  explicit  than  his  recantation  at  the 
close  of  his  Vindicius  Liberius  ?  Alter  telling  us  that 
he  had  withdrawn  from  sale,  after  the  second  edition, 
his  "'Christianity  not  Mysterious,' when  I  perceived 
what  real  or  pretended  offence  it  had  given,"  he  con- 
cludes thus: — "  Being  now  arrived  to  years  that  will  not 
wholly  excuse  inconsiderateness  in  resolving,  or  precipi- 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY.  245 

tance  in  acting,  I  firmly  hope  that  my  persuasion  and 
practice  will  show  me  to  be  a  true  Christian;  that  my  due 
conformity  to  the  imblic  worship  may  prove  me  to  be  a 
good  Churchman ;  and  that  my  untainted  loyalty  to 
King  William  will  argue  me  to  be  a  staunch  Common- 
wealth's-man.  That  I  shall  continue  all  my  life  a  friend 
to  religion,  an  enemy  to  superstition,  a  supporter  of  good 
kings,  and  a  deposer  of  tyrants." 

Observe,  this  Vindicius  Liberius  was  published  on  his 
return  from  one  of  his  political  tours  in  Germany.  His 
views  were  then  of  a  very  different  nature  from  those  of 
controversial  divinity ;  but  it  was  absolutely  necessary 
to  allay  the  storm  the  church  had  raised  against  him. 
We  begin  now  to  understand  a  little  better  the  character 
of  Toland.  These  literary  adventurers,  with  heroic 
pretensions,  can  practise  the  meanest  artifices,  and 
6hrink  themselves  into  nothing  to  creep  out  of  a  hole. 
How  does  this  recantation  agree  with  the  "  Nazarenus," 
and  the  other  theological  works  which  Toland  was  pub- 
lishing all  his  life  ?  Posterity  only  can  judge  of  men's 
characters ;  it  takes  in  at  a  glance  the  whole  of  a  life ; 
but  contemporaries  only  view  a  part,  often  apparently 
unconnected  and  at  variance,  when  in  fact  it  is  neither. 
This  recantation  is  full  of  the  spirit  of  Janus  Junius 
Toland. 

But  we  are  concerned  chiefly  with  Toland's  literary 
character.  He  was  so  confirmed  an  author,  that  he  never 
published  one  book  without  promising  another.  He 
refers  to  others  in  MS. ;  and  some  of  his  most  curious 
works  are  posthumous.     He  was  a  great  artificer  of  title- 


246  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

pages,  covering  them  with  a  promising  luxuriance;  and 
in  this  way  recommended  his  works  to  the  booksellers. 
He  had  an  odd  taste  for  running  inscriptions  of 
whimsical  crabbed  terms;  the  gold-dust  of  erudition  to 
gild  over  a  title;  such  as  "Tetradymus,  Hodegus, 
Clidopharus ;"  "  Adeisidaemon,  or  the  Unsuperstitious." 
He  pretends  these  affected  titles  indicated  their  several 
subjects;  but  the  genius  of  Toland  could  descend  to 
literary  quackery. 

He  had  the  art  of  propagating  books  ;  his  small  Life 
of  Milton  produced  several ;  besides  the  conrplacency  he 
felt  in  extracting  long  passages  from  Milton  against  the 
bishops.  In  this  Life,  his  attack  on  the  authenticity  of 
the  Eihon  Basilike  of  Charles  I.  branched  into  another 
on  supposititious  writings;  and  this  included  the 
spurious  gospels.  Association  of  ideas  is  a  nursing 
mother  to  the  fertility  of  authorship.  The  spurious 
gospels  opened  a  fresh  theological  campaign,  and  pro- 
duced his  "  Amyntor."  There  was  no  end  in  provoking 
an  author,  who,  in  writing  the  life  of  a  poet,  could  con- 
trive to  put  the  authenticity  of  the  Testament  to  the 
proof. 

Amid  his  philosophical  labours,  his  vanity  induced 
him  to  seize  on  all  temporary  topics  to  which  his  facility 
and  ingenuity  gave  currency.  The  choice  of  his  sub- 
jects forms  an  amusing  catalogue;  for  he  had  "Re- 
marks "  and  "  Projects  "  as  fast  as  events  were  passing. 
lie  wrote  on  the  "  Art  of  Governing  by  Parties,"  on 
"  Anglia  Liberia,"  "  Reasons  for  Naturalising  the  Jews," 
on  "The  Art  of  Canvassing  ut  Llec-lions,"  "  On  raisin"-  a 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY  247 

National  Bank  without  Capital,"  "The  State  Anatomy," 
"  Dunkirk  or  Dover,"  &c.  &c.  These,  and  many  like 
these,  set  off  with  catching  titles,  proved  to  the  author 
that  a  man  of  genius  may  be  capable  of  writing  on  all 
topics  at  all  times,  and  make  the  country  his  debtor 
without  benefiting  his  own  creditors.* 

There  was  a  moment  in  Toland's  life  when  he  felt,  or 
thought  he  felt,  fortune  in  his  grasp.  He  was  then  float- 
ing on  the  ideal  waves  of  the  South  Sea  bubble.  The 
poor  author,  elated  with  a  notion  that  he  was  rich  enough 
to  print  at  his  own  cost,  dispersed  copies  of  his  absurd 
"  Pantheisticon."  He  describes  a  society  of  Pantheists, 
who  worship  the  universe  as  God ;  a  mystery  much 
greater  than  those  he  attacked  in  Christianity.  Their 
prayers  are  passages  from  Cicero  and  Seneca  and  they 
chant  long  poems  instead  of  psalms  ;  so  that  in  their  zeal 
they  endure,  a  little  tediousness.  The  next  objectionable 
circumstance  in  this  wild  ebullition  of  philosophical  wan- 
tonness is  the  apparent  burlesque  of  some  liturgies  ;  and  a 
wag  having  inserted  in  some  copies  an  impious  prayer  to 
Bacchus,  Toland  suffered  for  the  folly  of  others  as  well  as 

*  In  examining  the  original  papers  of  Tolaml,  which  are  preserved, 
I  found  some  of  his  agreements  with  booksellers.  For  his  description 
of  Epsom  he  was  to  receive  only  four  guineas  in  case  1000  were  sold. 
He  received  ten  guineas  for  his  pamphlet  on  Naturalising  the  Jews, 
and  ten  guineas  more  in  case  Bernard  Lintott  sold  2000.  The  word* 
of  this  agreement  run  thus:  "Whenever  Mr.  Toland  calls  for  tea 
guineas,  after  the  first  of  February  next,  I  promise  to  pay  them,  if  I 
cannot  shav  that  '200  of  the  copies  remain  unsold."  What  a  sublime 
person  is  an  author!  What  a  misery  is  authorship  !  The  great  phi- 
losopher who  creates  systems  that  are  to  alter  the  face  of  his  country, 
must  stand  at  the  counter  to  count  out  200  unsold  copies ! 


24S  CALA3IITTES   OF    AUTHORS. 

his  own.*  "With  the  South  Sea  bubble  vanished  Toland's 
desire  of  printing  books  at  his  own  risk  ;  and  thus  relieved 
the  world  from  the  weight  of  more  PantheisHeons I 

With  all  this  bustle  of  authorship,  amidst  temporary 
publications  which  required  such  prompt  ingenuity,  and 
elaborate  works  which  matured  the  fruits  of  early 
studies,  Toland  was  still  not  a  sedentary  writer.  I  find 
that  he  often  travelled  on  the  continent ;  but  how  could  a 
guinealess  author  so  easily  transport  himself  from  Flan- 
ders to  Germany,  and  appear  at  home  in  the  courts  of 
Berlin,  Dresden,  and  Hanover?  Perhaps  we  may  dis- 
cover a  concealed  feature  in  the  character  of  our  ambigu- 
ous philosopher. 

In  the  only  Life  we  have  of  Toland,  by  Des  ATaiseaux, 
prefixed  to  his  posthumous  works,  he  tells  us,  that 
Toland  was  at  the  court  of  Berlin,  but  "  an  incident,  too 
ludicrous  to  be  mentioned,  obliged  him  to  leave  that  place 
sooner  than  he  expected."  Here  is  an  incident  in  a  nar- 
rative clearly  marked  out,  but  never  to  be  supplied  ! 
Whatever  this  incident  was,  it  had  this  important  result, 
that  it  sent  Toland  away  in  haste ;  but  irhy  was  he 
there  ?      Our   chronological   biographer,  f    "  good    easy 

*  Des  Maiseaux  frees  Toland  from  this  calumny,  and  hints  at  his  own 
personal  knowledge  of  the  author — but  he  does  not  know  what  a 
foreign  writer  authenticates,  that  this  blasphemous  address  to  Bacchus 
is  a  parody  of  a  prayer  in  the  Roman  ritual,  written  two  centuries 
before  by  a  very  proper  society  of  I  a  club  of  drunkards ! 

f  Warburton  has  well  described  Des  Maiseaux:  ''All  the  Life- 
writers  we  have  had  are.  indeed,  strange  insipid  creatures.  The  ver- 
bose tasteless  Frenchman  seems  to  lay  it  down  as  a  principle  that 
every  life  must  be  a  book,  and  what  is  worse,  it  proves  a  book  without 
a  life ;  for  what  do  we  know  of  Boileau,  after  all  his  tedious  stuff?" 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY.  949 

man,"  suspects  nothing  more  extraordinary  when  he  tells 
us  Toland  was  at  Berlin  or  Hanover,  than  when  he  finds 
him  at  Epsom  ;  imagines  Toland  only  went  to  the  Elec- 
toral Princess  Sophia,  and  the  Queen  of  Prussia,  who 
were  "  ladies  of  sublime  genius,"  to  entertain  them  by- 
vexing  some  grave  German  divines,  with  philosophical 
conferences,  and  paradoxical  conundrums ;  all  the  ra- 
vings of  Toland's  idleness.* 

This  secret  history  of  Toland  can  only  be  picked  out 
by  fine  threads.  He  professed  to  be  a  literary  character 
— he  had  opened  a  periodical  ''  literary  correspondence," 
as  he  terms  it,  with  Prince  Eugene;  such  as  we  have 
witnessed  in  our  days  by  Grimm  and  La  Ilarpe,  ad- 
dressed to  some  northern  princes.  He  was  a  favourite 
with  the  Electoral  Princess  Sophia  and  the  Queen  of 
Prussia,  to  whom  he  addressed  his  "Letters  to  Serena." 
Was  he  a  political  agent  ?  Yet  how  was  it  that  Toland 
was  often  driven  home  by  distressed  circumstances  ? 
He  seems  not  to  have  been  a  practical  politician,  for  he 
managed  his  own  affairs  very  ill.  Was  the  political  in- 
triguer rather  a  suspected  than  a  confidential  servant  of 
all  his  masters  and  mistresses?  for  it  is  evident  no  one 
cared  for  him  !     The  absence  of  moral   integrity  was 

*  One  of  these  philosophical  conferences  has  been  preserved  by 
Beausobre,  who  was  indeed  the  party  concerned.  He  inserted  it  in 
the  "Bibliotheque  Germanique,"  ;i  curious  literary  journal,  in  50  vol- 
umes, written  by  L' Enfant,  Beausobre,  and  Formey.  It  is  very 
copious,  and  very  curious,  and  is  preserved  in  the  General  Dictionary, 
art.  Toland.  The  parties,  after  a  warm  contest,  were  very  wisply 
interrupted  by  the  Queen,  when  she  discovered  they  had  exhausted 
their  learning,  and  were  beginning  to  rail  at  each  other. 


OjO  calamities  of  authors. 

probably  never  disguised  by  the  loquacious  vanity  of 
this  literary  adventurer. 

In  his  posthumous  works  are  several  "Memorials,"  for 
the  Earl  of  Oxford,  which  throw  a  new  light  over  a 
union  of  political  espionage  with  the  literary  character, 
which  finally  concluded  in  producing  that  extraordinary 
one  which  the  political  imagination  of  Toland  created  in 
all  the  obscurity  and  heat  of  his  reveries. 

In  one  of  these  "  Memorials,"  forcibly  written  and  full 
of  curiosity,  Toland  remonstrates  with  the  minister  for  his 
marked  neglect  of  him ;  opens  the  scheme  of  a  political 
tour,  where,  like  Guthrie,  he  would  be  content  with  his 
quarterage.  lie  defines  his  character;  for  the  independ- 
ent Whig  affects  to  spurn  at  the  office,  though  he  might 
not  shrink  at  the  duties  of  a  spy. 

"  Whether  such  a  person,  sir,  who  is  neither  minister 
nor  spy,  and  as  a  lover  of  learning  will  be  welcome  every- 
where, may  not  prove  of  extraordinary  use  to  my  Lord 
Treasurer,  as  well  as  to  his  predecessor  Burleigh,  who 
employed  such,  I  leave  his  lordship  and  you  to  consider." 

Still  this  character,  whatever  title  may  designate  it,  is 
inferior  in  dignity  and  importance  to  that  which  Toland 
afterwards  projected,  and  which  portrays  him  where  his 
life-writer  has  not  given  a  touch  from  his  brush  ;  it  is 
a  political  curiosity. 

"  I  laid  an  honester  scheme  of  serving  my  country, 
your  lordship,  and  myself;  for,  seeing  it  was  neither 
convenient  for  you,  nor  a  thing  at  all  desired  by  me,  that 
I  should  appear  in  any  2>ublic  post,  I  sincerely  proposed, 
as  occasions  should  offer,  to  communicate  to  your  lord- 


THE    VICTIMS    OP    VANITY.  251 

ship  my  observations  on  the  temper  of  the  ministry ,  the 
dispositio?is  of  the  people,  the  condition  of  our  enemies  or 
allies  abroad,  and  what  I  might  think  most  expedient  in 
every  conjuncture  /  which  advice  you  were  to  follow  in 
whole,  or  in  part,  or  not  at  all,  as  your  own  superior 
wisdom  should  direct.  My  general  acquaintance,  the 
several  languages  I  speak,  the  experience  I  have  acquired 
in  foreign  affairs,  and  being  engaged  in  no  interest  at 
home,  besides  that  of  the  public,  should  qualify  me  in 
some  measure  for  this  province.     All  wise   ministers 

HAVE    EVER   HAD    SUCH    PRIVATE    MONITORS.       As  much  as 

I  thought  myself  fit,  or  was  thought  so  by  others,  for 
such  general  observations,  so  much  have  I  ever  abhorred, 
my  lord,  those  particular  observers  we  call  Spies  ;  but  I 
despise  the  calumny  no  less  than  I  detest  the  thing. 
Of  such  general  observations,  you  should  have  perused 
a  far  greater  number  than  I  thought  fit  to  present 
hitherto,  had  I  discovered,  by  due  effects,  that  they  were 
acceptable  from  me;  for  they  must  unavoidably  be 
received  from  somebody,  unless  a  minister  were  omni- 
scient— yet  I  soon  had  good  reason  to  believe  I  was  not 
designed  for  the  man,  whatever  the  original  sin  could  be 
that  made  me  incapable  of  such  a  trust,  and  which  I 
now  begin  to  suspect.  Without  direct  answers  to  my 
proposals,  how  could  I  know  whether  I  helped  my 
friends  elsewhere,  or  betrayed  them  contrary  to  my 
Intentions !  and  accordingly  I  have  for  some  time  been 
very  cautious  and  reserved.  But  if  your  lordship  will 
enter  into  any  measures  with  me  to  procure  the  good  of 
my  country,  I  shall  be  more  ready  to  serve  your  lordship 


252  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

in  this,  or  in  some  becoming  capacity,  than  any  other 
minister.  They  who  confided  to  my  management  affairs 
of  a  higher  nature  have  found  me  exact  as  -well  as  secret. 
My  impenetrable  negociation  at  Vienna  (hid  under  the 
pretence  of  curiosity)  was  not  only  applauded  by  the 
prince  that  employed  me,  but  also  proportionably 
rewarded.  And  here,  my  lord,  give  me  leave  to  say 
that  I  have  found  England  miserably  served  abroad 
since  this  change  ;  and  our  ministers  at  home  are  some- 
times as  great  strangers  to  the  genius  as  to  the  persons 

of  those  with  whom   they  have  to  do.     At  you 

have  placed  the  most  unacceptable  man  in  the  world — 
one  that  lived  in  a  scandalous  misunderstanding  with 
the  minister  of  the  States  at  another  court — one  that  has 
been  the  laughing-stock  of  all  courts,  for  his  senseless 
haughtiness  and  most  ridiculous  airs — and  one  that  can 
never  judge  aright,  unless  by  accident,  in  anything." 

The  discarded,  or  the  suspected  private  monitor  of  the 
3finister  warms  into  the  tenderest  language  of  political 
amour,  and  mourns  their  rupture  but  as  the  quarrels  of 
lovers. 

"  I  cannot,  from  all  these  considerations,  but  in  the 
nature  of  a  lover,  complain  of  your  present  neglect,  and 
be  solicitous  for  your  future  care."  And  again,  "I  have 
made  use  of  the  simile  of  a  lover,  and  as  such,  indeed,  I 
thought  fit,  once  for  all,  to  come  to  a  thorough  explana- 
tion, resolved,  if  my  affection  be  not  killed  by  your 
unkindness,  to  become  indissolubly  yours." 

Such  is  the  nice  artifice  which  colours,  with  a  pre- 
tended love  of  his  country,  the  sordidness  of  the  political 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY.  253 

intriguer,  giving  clean  names  to  filthy  things.  But  this 
view  of  the  political  face  of  our  Janus  is  not  complete 
till  we  discover  the  levity  he  could  carry  into  politics 
when  not  disguised  by  more  pompous  pretensions.  I 
shall  give  two  extracts  from  letters  composed  in  a 
different  spirit. 

"  I  am  bound  for  Germany,  though  first  for  Flanders, 
and  next  for  Holland.  I  believe  I  shall  be  pretty  well 
accommodated  for  this  voyage,  which  I  expect  will  be 
very  short.  Lord  !  how  near  was  my  old  woman  being 
a  queen !  and  your  humble  servant  being  at  his  ease.'''' 

His  old  woman  was  the  Electoral  Princess  Sophia; 
and  his  ease  is  what  patriots  distinguish  as  the  love  of 
their  country  !     Again — 

"  The  October  Club,*  if  rightly  managed,  will  be  rare 
stuff  to  work  the  ends  of  any  party.  I  sent  such  an 
account  of  these  wights  to  an  old  gentlewoman  of  my 
acquaintance,  as  in  the  midst  of  fears  (the  change  of 
ministry)  will  make  her  laugh." 

After  all  his  voluminous  literature,  and  his  refined 
politics,  Toland  lived  and  died  the  life  of  an  Author  by 
Profession,  in  an  obscure  lodging  at  a  country  carpen- 
ter's, in  great  distress.  He  had  still  one  patron  left,  who 
was  himself  poor,  Lord  Molesworth,  who  promised  him, 
if  he  lived, 

"  Bare  necessaries.     These  are  but  cold  comfort  to  a 

*  A  political  society  which  obtained  its  name  from  the  malt  liquors 
consumed  at  its  meetings,  and  which  was  popularly  termed  October 
from  the  month  when  it  was  usually  brewed.  This  club  advocated  the 
claims  of  the  House  of  Hanover,  and  may  have  originated  the  Mug- 
houses  noted  in  p.  52. — Ed. 


25J.  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

man  of  your  spirit  and  desert ;  but  'tis  all  I  dare  prom- 
ise !  'Tis  an  ungrateful  age,  and  Ave  must  bear  with  it 
the  best  we  may  till  we  can  mend  it." 

And  bis  lordship  tells  of  his  unsuccessful  application 
to  some  Whig  lord  for  Toland;  and  concludes, 

"  'Tis  a  sad  monster  of  a  man,  and  not  worthy  of 
further  notice." 

I  have  observed  that  Toland  had  strong  nerves  ;  he 
neither  feared  controversies,  nor  that  which  closes  all. 
Having  examined  his  manuscripts,  I  can  sketch  a  minute 
picture  of  the  last  days  of  our  "  author  by  profession." 
At  the  carpenter's  lodgings  he  drew  up  a  list  of  all  his 
books — they  were  piled  on  four  chairs,  to  the  amount  of 
155 — most  of  them  works  which  evince  the  most  erudite 
studies ;  and  as  Toland's  learning  has  been  very  lightly 
esteemed,  it  may  be  worth  notice  that  some  of  his  MSS; 
were  ti-anscribed  in  Greek.*     To  this  list  he  adds — "  I 

*  I  subjoin,  for  the  gratification  of  the  curious,  the  titles  of  a  few 
of  these  books.  "Spanhemii  Opera;"  "Clerici  Pentateuchus;"'  '•  Con- 
stantini  Lexicon  Gneco-Latinum ;"  •'Fabricii  Codex  Apocryphus  Vet. 
et  Nov.  Test.;"  "Synesiusde  Regno;"  "Historia  Imaginum  Coelestium 
Gosselini,"  16  volumes;  "Caryophili  Dissertationes;"  "  Vonde  Hardt 
Ephemerides  Philological  ;"  '' Trismegisti  Opera;"  '•  Recoldus,  et  alia 
imedica;"  all  the  Works  of  Buxtorf;  "Silviatri  Opera;"  "  Reland 
de  Relig.  Mabomedica;"  "Galli  Opuscula  Mythologica ;"  "  Apollodori 
Bibliotheca;"  "  Palingenius;"  "Apuleius;"  and  every  classical  author 
of  antiquity.  As  he  was  then  employed  in  his  curious  history  of  the 
Druids,  of  which  only  a  specimen  is  preserved,  we  may  trace  his 
irches  in  the  following  books:  "Luydii  Archa^ologia  Britannica  ;" 
"Old  Irish  Testament,"  <fcc. ;  " Maccurtin's  History  of  Ireland;" 
"  OTlaherty's  Ogygia;"  "  Epistolarum  Hibernicarum;"  "Usher's 
_ion  of  the  ancient  Irish  ;"  il  Brand's  Isles  of  Orkney  and  Zetland;" 
'•  Pczron's  Antiquitea  des  (Vltes." 

There  are  some  singular  papers  among  these  fragments.     One  title 


THE    VICTIMS    OF    VANITY".  255 

need  not  recite  those  in  the  closet  with  the  unbound 
books  and  pamphlets;  nor  my  trunk,  wherein  are  all  my 
papers  and  MSS."  I  perceive  he  circulated  his  MSS. 
among  his  friends,  for  there  is  a  list  by  him  as  he  lent 
them,  among  which  are  ladies  as  well  as  gentlemen, 
espr its  forts  ! 

Never  has  author  died  more  in  character  than  Toland ; 
he  may  be  said  to  have  died  with  a  busy  pen  in  his 
hand.  Having  suffered  from  an  unskilful  physician,  he 
avenged  himself  in  his  own  way  ;  for  there  was  found 
on  his  table  an  "  Essay  on  Physic  without  Physicians." 
The  dying  patriot-trader  was  also  writing  a  preface  for  a 
political  pamphlet  on  the  danger  of  mercenary  Parlia- 
ments;  and  the  philosopher  was  composing  his  own 
epitaph — one  more  proof  of  the  ruling  passion  pre- 
dominating in  death;  but  why  should  a  Pantheist  be 
solicitous  to  perpetuate  his  genius  and  his  fame  !  I  shall 
transcribe  a  few  lines ;  surely  they  are  no  evidence  of 
Atheism  ' 

Omnium  Literarum  excultor, 

ac  linguarum  plus  decern  sciens; 

Veritatis  propugnator, 

Libertatis  assertor; 

nullus  autem  sectator  aut  cliens, 

nee  minis,  nee  malis  est  inflexus, 

quin  quam  elegit,  viam  perageret; 

utili  honestum  anteferens. 

of  a  work  is  "  Priesthood  without  Priestcraft ;  or  Superstition  dis- 
tinguished from  Religion,  Dominion  from  Order,  and  Bigotry  from 
Reason,  in  the  most  principal  Controversies  about  Church  government, 
which  at  present  divide  and  deform  Christianity."  He  has  composed 
"  A  Psalm  before  Sermon  in  praise  of  Asinity."  There  are  other 
singular  titles  and  works  in  tbe  mass  of  his  papers. 


256  CALAMITIES    OF  AUTHORS. 

Spiritus  cum  aethereo  patre, 
a.  quo  prodiit  olim,  conjungitur; 

corpus  iiem.  Naturae  cedens, 

in  materno  greniio  reponitur. 
Ipse  vero  aeternura  est  resurrecturus 
at  idem  futurus  Tolaxdus  nunquam.* 

One  would,  have  imagined  that  the  writer  of  his  own 
panegyrical  epitaph  would  have  been  careful  to  have 
transmitted  to  posterity  a  copy  of  his  features  ;  but  I 
know  of  no  portrait  of  Toland.  His  patrons  seem  never 
to  have  been  generous,  nor  his  disciples  grateful ;  they 
mortified  rather  than  indulged  the  egotism  of  his  genius. 
There  appeared,  indeed,  an  elegy,  shortly  after  the  death 
of  Toland,  so  ingeniously  contrived,  that  it  is  not  clear 
whether  he  is  eulogised  or  ridiculed.  Amid  its  solem- 
nity these  lines  betray  the  sneer.  "  Has,"  exclaimed  the 
eulogist  of  the  ambiguous  philosopher, 

Each  jarring  element  gone  angry  home? 
And  Master  Toland  a  Non-ens  become  ? 

Locke,  with  all  the  prescient  sagacity  of  that  clear  un- 

*  A  lover  of  all  literature, 

and  knowing  more  than  ten  languages ; 

a  champion  for  truth, 

an  assertor  of  liberty, 

but  the  follower  or  dependant  of  no  man  ; 

nor  could  menaces  nor  fortune  bend  him  ; 

the  way  he  had  chosen  he  pursued, 

preferring  honesty  to  his  interest. 

His  spirit  is  joined  with  its  ethereal  father 

from  whom  it  originally  proceeded ; 

his  body  likewise,  yiel  ling  to  Nature, 

is  again  laid  in  the  lap  of  its  mother: 

but  he  is  about  to  rise  again  in  eternity, 

yet  never  to  be  the  same  Tolaxd  more. 


GENIUS   THE   DUPE  OF   ITS  PASSIONS.  257 

derstan<ling  which  penetrated  under  the  secret  folds  of 
the  human  heart,  anticipated  the  life  of  Toland  at  its 
commencement.  He  admired  the  genius  of  the  man ; 
bat,  while  he  valued  his  parts  and  learning,  he  dreaded 
their  result.  In  a  letter  I  find  these  passages,  which 
were  then -so  prophetic,  and  are  now  so  instructive  : — 

"  If  his  exceeding  great  value  of  himself  do  not  deprive 
the  world  of  that  usefulness  that  his  parts,  if  rightly  con- 
ducted, might  be  of,  I  shall  be  very  glad. — The  hopes 
young  men  give  of  what  use  they  will  make  of  their  parts 
is,  to  me,  the  encouragement  of  being  concerned  for 
them ;  but,  if  vanity  increases  with  age,  I  always  fear 
whither  it  will  lead  a  man." 


GENIUS  THE  DUPE  OF  ITS  PASSIONS. 

TDOPE  said  that  Steele,  though  he  led  a  careless  and 
-*-  vicious  life,  had  nevertheless  a  love  and  reverence 
for  virtue.  The  life  of  Steele  was  not  that  of  a  retired 
scholar ;  hence  his  moral  character  becomes  more  instruc- 
tive. He  was  one  ot  those  whose  hearts  are  the  dupes 
of  their  imaginations,  and  who  are  hurried  through  life 
by  the  most  despotic  volition.  He  always  preferred  his 
caprices  to  his  interests ;  or,  according  to  his  own  notion, 
very  ingenious,  but  not  a  little  absurd,  "  he  was  always 
of  the  humour  of  preferring  the  state  of  his  mind  to  that 
of  his  fortune."  The  result  of  this  principle  of  moral 
conduct  was,  that  a  man  of  the  most  admirable  abilities 
was  perpetually  acting  like  a  fool,  and,  with  a  warm  at- 
tachment to  virtue,  was  the  frailest  of  human  beings. 
17 


25S  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

In  the  first  act  of  his  life  we  find  the  seed  that  devel- 
oped itself  in  the  succeeding  ones.  His  ancle  could  not 
endure  a  hero  for  his  heir :  but  Steele  had  seen  a  march- 
ing regiment  ;  a  sufficient  reason  with  him  to  enlist  as  a 
private  in  the  horse-gnards :  cocking  his  hat,  and  put- 
ting on  a  broad-sword,  jack-boots,  and  shoulder-belt,  with 
the  most  generous  feelings  he  forfeited  a  very  good 
estate. — At  length  Ensign  Steele's  frank  temper  and  wit 
conciliated  esteem,  and  extorted  admiration,  and  the  en- 
sign became  a  favourite  leader  in  all  the  dissipations  of 
the  town.  All  these  were  the  ebullitions  of  genius,  which 
had  not  yet  received  a  legitimate  direction.  Amid  these 
orgies,  however,  it  was  often  pensive,  and  forming  itself; 
for  it  was  in  the  height  of  these  irregularities  that  Steele* 
composed  his  "  Christian  Hero,"  a  moral  and  religious 
treatise,  which  the  contritions  of  every  morning  dictat- 
ed, and  to  which  the  disorders  of  every  evening  added 
another  penitential  page.  Perhaps  the  genius  of  Steele 
was  never  so  ardent  and  so  pure  as  at  this  period ;  and  in 
his  elegant  letter  to  his  commander,  the  celebrate*!  Lord 
Cutts,  he  gives  an  interesting  account  of  the  origin  of 
tlii-  production,  which  none  but  one  deeply  imbued  with 
its  feelings  could  have  so  forcibly  described. 

"  Tower  Guard,  March  23,  1701. 
"Mr  Lonn, — The  address  of  the  following  papers  is 
so  very  much  due  to  your  lordship,  that  they  are  but  a 
mere  report  of  what  has  passed  upon  my  guard  to  my 
commander;  for  they  were  writ  upon  duly,  when  the 
mind   was  perfectly  disengaged,  and  at  leisure,  in  the 


GENIUS  THE   DUPE   OF  ITS   PASSIONS.  259 

silent  watch  of  the  night,  to  run  over  the  busy  dream  of 
the  day ;  and  the  vigilance  which  obliges  us  to  suppose 
an  enemy  always  near  us,  has  awakened  a  sense  that  there 
is  a  restless  and  subtle  one  which  constantly  attends  our 
steps,  and  meditates  our  ruin."  * 

To  this  solemn  and  monitory  work  he  prefixed  his 
name,  from  this  honourable  motive,  that  it  might  serve 
as  "  a  standing  testimony  against  himself,  and  make  him 
ashamed  of  understanding,  and  seeming  to  feel  what  was 
virtuous,  and  living  so  quite  contrary  a  life."  Do  we 
not  think  that  no  one  less  than  a  saint  is  speaking  to  us  ? 
And  yet  he  is  still  nothing  more  than  Ensign  Steele ! 
He  tells  us  that  this  grave  work  made  him  considered, 
who  had  been  no  undelightful  companion,  as  a  disagree- 
able fellow — and  "  The  Christian  Hero,"  by  his  own 
words,  appears  to  have  fought  off  several  fool-hardy 
geniuses  who  were  for  "  trying  their  valour  on  him," 
supposing  a  saint  was  necessarily  a  poltroon.  Thus 
"  The  Christian  Hero,"  finding  himself  slighted  by  his 
loose  companions,  sat  down  and  composed  a  most  laugh- 
able comedy,  "  The  Funeral ;"  and  with  all  the  frankness 
of  a  man  who  cares  not  to  hide  his  motives,  he  tells  us, 
that  after  his  religious  work  he  wrote  the  comedy  be- 
cause "  nothing  can  make  the  town  so  fond  of  a  man  as  a 
successful  play."  f  The  historian  who  had  to  record 
such  strange  events,  following  close  on  each  other,  as  an 

*  Mr.  Nichols's  "Epistolary  Correspondence  of  Sir  Richard  Steele," 
vol.  i.  p.  77. 

f  Steele  has  given  a  delightful  piece  of  self-biography  towards  the 
end  of  his  "Apology  for  Himself  and  his  Writings,"  p.  80,  4to. 


260  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

author  publishing  a  book  of  piety,  and  then  a  farce, 
could  never  have  discovered  the  secret  motive  of  the 
versatile  writer,  had  not  that  writer  possessed  the  most 
honest  frankness. 

Steele  was  now  at  once  a  man  of  the  town  and  its  cen- 
sor, and  wrote  lively  essays  on  the  follies  of  the  day  in 
an  enormous  black  peruke  which  cost  him  fifty  guineas  ! 
He  built  an  elegant  villa,  but,  as  he  was  always  inculca- 
ting economy,  he  dates  from  "  The  Hovel."  He  detected 
the  fallacy  of  the  South  Sea  scheme,  while  he  himself  in- 
vented projects,  neither  inferior  in  magnificence  nor  in 
misery.  He  even  turned  alchemist,  and  wanted  to  coin 
gold,  merely  to  distribute  it.  The  most  striking  incident 
in  the  life  of  this  man  of  volition,  was  his  sudden  mar- 
riage with  a  young  lady  who  attended  his  first  wife's 
funeral — struck  by  her  angelical  beauty,  if  we  trust  to 
his  raptures.  Yet  this  sage,  who  would  have  written  so 
well  on  the  choice  of  a  wife,  united  himself  to  a  character 
the  most  uncongenial  to  his  own  ;  cold,  reserved,  and 
most  anxiously  prudent  in  her  attention  to  money,  she 
was  of  a  temper  which  every  day  grew  worse  by  the 
perpetual  imprudence  and  thoughtlessness  of  his  own. 
He  calls  her  "Prue"  in  fondness  and  reproach;  she  was 
Prudery  itself!  His  adoration  was  permanent,  and  so 
were  his  complaints  ;  and  they  never  parted  but  with 
bickerings — yet  he  could  not  suffer  her  absence,  for  he 
was  writing  to  her  three  or  four  passionate  notes  in  a 
day,  which  are  dated  from  his  office,  or  his  bookseller's, 
or  from  some  friend's  house — he  has  risen  in  the  midst 
of  dinner  to  despatch  a  line  to  "  Prue,"  to  assure  her  of 


GENIUS  THE  DUPE  OF  ITS  PASSIONS.  261 

his  affection  since  noon.* — Her  presence  or  her  absence 
was  equally  painful  to  him. 

*  In  the  "  Epistolary  Correspondence  of  Sir  Richard  Steele,"  edition 
of  1809,  are  preserved  these  extraordinary  love-despatches ;  "Prue" 
used  poor  Steele  at  times  very  ill ;  indeed  Steele  seems  to  have  con- 
ceived that  his  warm  affections  were  all  she  required,  for  Lady  Steele 
was  usually  left  whole  days  in  solitude,  and  frequently  in  want  of  a 
guinea,  when  Steele  could  not  raise  one.  He,  however,  sometimes  re- 
monstrates with  her  very  feelingly.  The  following  note  is  an 
instance : — 

"  Dear  Wife, — I  have  been  in  great  pain  of  body  and  mind  since  I 
came  out.  You  are  extremely  cruel  to  a  generous  nature,  which  lias 
a  tenderness  for  you  that  renders  your  least  dishumour  insupportably 
afflicting.  Aft9r  short  starts  of  passion,  not  to  be  inclined  to  reconcili- 
ation, is  what  is  against  all  rules  of  Christianity  and  justice.  When  I 
come  home,  I  beg  to  be  kindly  received ;  or  this  will  have  as  ill  an 
effect  upon  my  fortune,  as  on  my  mind  and  body." 

In  a  postscript  to  another  billet,  he  thus  "  sneers  at  Lady  Steele's 
excessive  attention  to  money": — 

"  Four  man  Sam  owes  me  threepence,  which  must  be  deducted  in 
the  account  between  you  and  me ;  therefore,  pray  take  care  to  get  it 
in,  or  stop  it." 

Such  despatches  as  the  following  were  sent  off  three  or  four  times 
in  a  day: — 

"I  beg  of  you  not  to  be  impatient,  though  it  be  an  hour  before  you 
see  Your  obliged  husband,  R.  Steele." 

"Dear  Prue, — Don't  be  displeased  that  I  do  not  come  home  till 
eleven  o'clock.  Yours,  ever." 

"Dear  Prue, — Forgive  me  dining  abroad,  and  let  Will  carry  the 
papers  to  Buckley's.  Your  fond  devoted  R.  S." 

"  Dear  Prde, — I  am  very  sleepy  and  tired,  but  could  not  think  of 
closing  my  eyes  till  I  had  told  you  I  am,  dearest  creature,  your  most 
affectionate,  faithful  husband,  R.  Steele. 

"  From  the  Press,  One  in  the  morning." 

It  would  seem  by  the  following  note  that  this  hourly  account  of 
fiimself  was  in  consequence  of  the  connubial  mandate  of  his  fair 
despot: — 

"  Dear  Prue, — It  is  a  strange  thing,  because  you  are  handsome, 
that  you  will  not  behave  yourself  with  the  obedience  that  people  of 


262  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

Yet  Steele,  gifted  at  all  times  with  the  susceptibility 
of  genius,  was  exercising  the  finest  feelings  of  the  heart ; 
the  same  generosity  of  temper  which  deluded  his  judg- 
ment, and  invigorated  his  passions,  rendered  him  a 
tender  and  pathetic  dramatist ;  a  most  fertile  essayist ; 
a  patriot  without  private  views;  an  enemy  whose  resent- 
ment died  away  in  raillery;  and  a  friend,  who  could 
warmly  press  the  hand  that  chastised  him.  Whether  in 
administration,  or  expelled  the  House ;  whether  affluent, 
or  flying  from  his  creditors ;  in  the  fulness  of  his  heart 
he,  perhaps,  secured  his  own  happiness,  and  lived  on,  like 
some  wits,  extempore.  But  such  men,  with  all  then- 
virtues  and  all  their  genius,  live  only  for  themselves. 

Steele,  in  the  waste  of  his  splendid  talents,  had  raised 
6udden  enmities  and  transient  friendships.  The  world 
uses  such  men  as  Eastern  travellers  do  fountains;  they 
drink  their  waters,  and  when  their  thirst  is  appeased, 
turn  their  backs  on  them.  Steele  lived  to  be  forgotten. 
He  opened  his  career  with  folly  ;  he  hurried  through  it 
in  a  tumult  of  existence  ;  and  he  closed  it  by  an  involun- 
tary exile,  amid  the  wrecks  of  his  fortune  and  his  mind. 

Steele,  in  one  of  his  numerous  periodical  works,  the 
twelfth  number  of  the  "Theatre,"  lias  drawn  an  exquisite 
contrast  between  himself  and  his  friend  Addison:  it  is  a 
cabinet  picture.  Steele's  careful  pieces,  when  warm  with 
his  subject,  had  a  higher  spirit,  a  richer  flavour,  than  the 
equable  softness  of  Addison,  who  is  only  beautiful. 

worse  features  do — but  that  I  must  bo  always  giving  you  an  account 
of  every  trifle  and  minute  of  my  time.  I  send  this  to  tell  you  I 
am  waiting  to  be  sent  for  again  when  my  Lord  Wharton  is  stirring." 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  263 

"There  never  was  a  more  strict  friendship  than 
between  these  gentlemen  ;  nor  had  they  ever  any  dif- 
ference but  what  proceeded  from  their  different  way  of 
pursuing  the  same  thing :  the  one,  with  patience,  foresight, 
and  temperate  address,  always  waited  and  stemmed  the 
torrent ;  while  the  other  often  plunged  himself  into  it, 
and  was  as  often  taken  out  by  the  temper  of  him  who 
stood  weeping  on  the  bank  for  his  safety,  whom  he  could 
not  dissuade  from  leaping  into  it.  Thus  these  two  men 
lived  for  some  years  last  past,  shunning  each  other,  but 
still  preserving  the  most  passionate  concern  for  their 
mutual  welfare.  But  when  they  met,  they  were  as  unre- 
served as  boys  ;  and  talked  of  the  greatest  affairs,  upon 
which  they  saw  where  they  differed,  without  pressing 
(what  they  knew  impossible)  to  convert  each  other." 

If  Steele  had  the  honour  of  the  invention  of  those 
periodical  papers  which  first  enlightened  the  national 
genius  by  their  popular  instruction,  he  is  himself  a  re- 
markable example  of  the  moral  and  the  literary  character 
perpetually  contending  in  the  man  of  volition. 


LITERARY  DISAPPOINTMENTS  DISORDERING 
THE  INTELLECT. 

LELAXD     A  X  D      COLLINS. 

rT^HIS  awful  calamity  may  be  traced  in  the  fate  of 
-*-  Leland  and  Collins :  the  one  exhausted  the  finer 
faculties  of  his  mind  in  the  grandest  views,  and  sunk 
under  gigantic  tasks ;  the  other  enthusiast  sacrificed  his 
reason  and  his  happiness  to  his  imagination. 


264  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

Leland,  the  father  of  our  antiquaries,  was  an  accom- 
plished scholar,  and  his  ample  mind  had  embraced  the 
languages  of  antiquity,  those  of  his  own   age,  and  the 
ancient  ones  of  his  own  country:  thus  he  held  all  human 
learning  by  its  three  vast  chains.     He  travelled  abroad  ; 
and  he  cultivated  poetry  with  the  ardour  he  could  even 
feel  for  the  acquisition  of  words.     On  his  return  home, 
among  other  royal  favours,  he  was  appointed  by  Henry 
VIII.  the  king  s  antiquary,  a  title  honourably  created  for 
Leland;  for  with  him  it  became  extinct.     By  this  office 
he  was  empowered  to  search   after  English  antiquities  ■ 
to  review  the  libraries  of  all  the  religious  institutions' 
and  to  bring  the  records  of  antiquity  "out   of  deadly 
darkness  into  lively  light."     This  extensive  power  fed  a 
passion  already  formed  by  the  study  of  our  old  rude  his- 
torians; his   elegant   taste   perceived   that    they  wanted 
those  graces  which  he  could  hud  them. 

Six  years  were  occupied,  by  uninterrupted   travel   and 
study,  to  survey  our  national  antiquities;  to  note  down 
everything  observable  for  the  history  of  the  country  and 
the  honour  of  the  nation.     What  a  magnificent  view  has 
sketched  of  this  learned  journey!     In  search  of  knowl- 
Leland    wandered    on  the   sea-coasts  and   in   the 
midland;  surveyed  towns  and  cities,  ami   rivers,  castles, 
cathedrals,  and  monasteries;   tumuli,  coins,  and  inscrip- 
tions;   collected     authors;    transcribed     MSS.     U    anti- 
quarianism  pored,  genius  too  meditated   in   this  sublime 
industry. 

Another  six  ya,-  were  devoted  to  shape  and  to  polish 
the  immense  collections  he  had  amassed.     All  this  untired 


LITERARY    DIS ANOINTMENTS.  205 

labour  and  continued  study  were  rewarded  "by  Henry 
VIII.  It  is  delightful,  from  its  rarity,  to  record  the 
gratitude  of  a  patron:  Henry  was  worthy  of  Leland  ; 
and  the  genius  of  the  author  was  magnificent  as  that  of 
the  monarch  who  had  created  it. 

Nor  was  the  gratitude  of  Leland  silent :  he  seems  to 
have  been  in  the  habit  of  perpetuating  his  spontaneous 
emotions  in  elegant  Latin  verse.  Our  author  has  fanci- 
fully expressed  his  gratitude  to  the  king : — 

"Sooner,"  he  says,  "shall  the  seas  float  without  their 
silent  inhabitants ;  the  thorny  hedges  cease  to  hide  the 
birds;  the  oak  to  spread  its  boughs;  and  Flora  to  paint 
the  meadows  with  flowers ; 

Quam  Rex  dive,  tuum  labatur  peetore  nostro 

Nomen,  quod  studiis  portus  et  aura  meis. 
Than  thou,  great  King,  my  bosom  cease  to  hail, 
Who  o'er  my  studies  breath'st  a  favouring  gale." 

Leland  was,  indeed,  alive  to  the  kindness  of  his  royal 
patron  ;  and  among  his  numerous  literary  projects,  was 
one  of  writing  a  history  of  all  the  palaces  of  Henry,  in 
imitation  of  Procopius,  who  described  those  of  the  Em- 
peror Justinian.  He  had  already  delighted  the  royal  ear 
in  a  beautiful  effusion  of  fancy  and  antiquarianism,  in 
his  Cygnea  Cantio,  the  Song  of  the  Swans.  The  Swan 
of  Leland,  melodiously  floating  down  the  Thames,  from 
Oxford  to  Greenwich,  chants,  as  she  passes  along,  the 
ancient  names  and  honours  of  the  towns,  the  castles,  and 
the  villages. 

Leland  presented  his  "  Strena,  or  a  New  Year's  Gift," 
to  the  kins;. — It  consists  of  an  account  of  his  studies  ; 


26G  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

and  sketches,  with  a  fervid  and  vast  imagination.  Lis 
magnificent  labour,  winch  he  had  already  inscribed  with 
the  title  De  Antiquitate  JBritannica,  and  winch  was  to 
be  divided  into  as  many  books  as  there  were  shires.  All 
parts  of  this  address  of  the  King's  Antiquary  to  the  king 
bear  the  stamp  of  his  imagination  and  his  taste.  lie 
opens  his  intention  of  improving,  by  the  classical  graces 
of  composition,  the  rude  labours  of  our  ancestors ;  for, 

"  Except  Truth  be  delicately  clothed  in  purpure,  her 
written  verytees  can  scant  find  a  reader." 

Our  old  writers,  he  tells  his  sovereign,  had,  indeed, 

"  From  time  to  time  preserved  the  acts  of  your  prede- 
cessors, and  the  fortunes  of  your  realm,  with  great 
diligence,  and  no  less  faith;  would  to  God  with  like 
eloquence !" 

An  exclamation  of  fine  taste,  when  taste  was  yet  a 
stranger  in  the  country.  And  when  he  alludes  to  the 
knowledge  of  British  affairs  scattered  among  the  Roman, 
as  well  as  our  own  writers,  his  fervid  fancy  breaks  forth 
with  an  image  at  once  simple  and  sublime: — 

"I  tru^t.*'  >:iys  Leland,  "so  to  open  the  window,  that 
the  light  shall  be  seen  so  long,  that  is  to  say,  by  the 
space  of  a  whole  thousand  years  stopped  up,  and  the  old 
glory  of  your  Britain  to  re-flourish  through  the  world."* 

*  Le-land.  in  his  magnificent  plan,  included  several  curious  depart- 
ments. Jealous  of  the  literary  glory  of  the  Italians,  whom  he  com- 
pares to  the  Greeks  for  accounting  all  nations  barbarous  and  unletter- 
ed, he  h:  d  composed  four  books  l;De  Viris  Illustribus,''  on  English 
Authors,  to  force  them  to  acknowledge  the  illustrious  genius,  and  tho 
great  men  of  Britain.  Three  books  "  De  Nobi.kate  Britannica,''  were 
to  bo  "  as  an  ornament  and  a  right  comely  garland." 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  267 

And  he  pathetically  concludes — 

"Should  I  live  to  perform  those  things  that  are  already 
begun,  I  trust  that  your  realm  shall  so  well  be  known, 
once  painted  with  its  native  colours,  that  it  shall  give 
place  to  the  glory  of  no  other  region." 

The  grandeur  of  this  design  was  a  constituent  part  of 
the  genius  of  Leland,  but  not  less,  too,  was  that  presaging 
melancholy  which  even  here  betrays  itself,  and  even 
more  frequently  in  his  verses.  Everything  about  Leland 
was  marked  by  his  own  greatness ;  his  country  and  his 
countrymen  were  ever  present ;  and,  by  the  excitement 
of  his  feelings,  even  his  humbler  pursuits  were  elevated 
into  patriotism.  Henry  died  the  year  after  he  received 
the  "  New  Year's  Gift."  From  that  moment,  in  losing 
the  greatest  patron  for  the  greatest  work,  Leland  ap- 
pears to  have  felt  the  staff  which  he  had  used  to  turn  at 
pleasure  for  his  stay,  break  in  his  hands. 

He  had  new  patrons  to  court,  while  engaged  in  labours 
for  which  a  single  life  had  been  too  short.  The  melan- 
choly that  cherishes  genius  may  also  destroy  it.  Leland, 
brooding  over  his  voluminous  labours,  seemed  to  love  and 
to  dread  them ;  sometimes  to  pursue  them  with  rapture, 
and  sometimes  to  shrink  from  them  with  despair.  His 
generous  temper  had  once  shot  forwards  to  posterity  ; 
but  he  now  calms  his  struggling  hopes  and  doubts,  and 
confines  his  literary  ambition  to  his  own  country  and 
his  own  age. 

POSTERITATIS   AMOR   DUBIUS. 

Posteritatis  amor  mihi  perblanditur,  et  ultro 

Promittit  libris  secula  multa  meis. 
At  Hon  tarn  facile  est  oculato  imponere,  nosco 


208  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

Qnara  non  sim  tali  dignus  honore  fruL 
Graecia  magniloquos  vatcs  desiderat  ipsa, 

Roma  suos  etiam  dispcriisse  dolet. 
Exemplis  quum  sim  claris  edoctus  ab  istis, 

Qui  sperem  Musas  vivere  posse  meas? 
Certe  mi  sat  erit  praesenti  scribere  sreclo, 

Auribus  et  patriae  complacuisse  mese. 


Posterity,  thy  soothing  love  I  feel, 
That  o'er  my  volumes  many  an  age  may  steal: 
But  hard  it  is  the  well-clearM  eye  to  cheat 
"With  honours  undeserved,  too  fond  deceit  I 
Greece,  greatly  eloquent,  and  full  of  fame, 
Sighs  for  the  want  of  many  a  perish'd  name ; 
And  Rome  o'er  her  illusirious  children  mourns, 
Their  fame  departing  with  their  mouldering  urns. 
How  can  I  hope,  by  such  examples  shown, 
More  than  a  transient  day,  a  passing  sun  ? 
Enough  for  me  to  win  the  present  age, 
And  please  a  brother  with  a  brother's  page. 

By  other  verses,  addressed  to  Cranmer,  it  'would 
appear  that  Leland  was  experiencing  anxieties  to  which 
he  had  not  been  accustomed, — and  one  may  suspect,  by 
the  opening  image  of  his  "  Supellex,"  that  his  pension 
was  irregular,  and  that  he  began,  as  authors  do  in  these 
hard  cases,  to  value  "  the  furniture"  of  his  mind  above 
that  of  his  house. 

AD   THOSIAM    CRAXMEF.rJI,    CAST.    ARCHIEPISCOP. 

Est  congesta  mihi  domi  Supellex 
Ingens,  aurea.  nobilis,  venusta, 
Qui  totus  studeo  Britanniarum 
Tero  reddere  gloriam  nitori. 
Sed  Fortuna  meis  noverca  coeptis 
Jam  felicibus  invidet  maligna. 
Quare.  ne  pereaut  brevi  vel  hord 
Multarum  mihi  noctium  labores 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  200 

Omnes,  et  patriae  simul  decora 
Ornamcnta  cadant,  &c.  «&c. 

IMITATED. 

Tlio  furnitures  that  fill  my  house, 
Tlie  vast  and  beautiful  disclose, 
All  noble,  and  the  store  is  gold ; 
Our  ancient  glory  here  unroll'd. 
But  fortune  checks  my  during  claim, 
A  s'ep-aiother  severe  to  fame. 
A  smile  malignantly  she  throws 
Just  at  tli3  story's  prosperous  close. 
And  thus  must  the  uulinish'd  tale, 
And  all  my  many  vigils  fail, 
And  must  my  country's  honour  fall; 
In  one  brief  hour  must  perish  al.  ? 

But,  conscious  of  the  greatness  of  his  labours,  he  would 
obtain  the  favour  of  the  Archbishop,  by  promising  a 
share  of  his  own  fame — 

pretium  sequetur  amplum — 

Sic  uomen  tibi  litterie  elegantes 
Recte  parpetuum  dabuut,  suosque 
Partim  vel  titulos  tibi  receptos 
Concedut  memo:i  Britar.nus  ore: 
Sic  te  posteritas  aruabit  omnis, 
Et  fama,  super  sethera  iunotesces. 


But  take  the  ample  glorious  meed, 
To  letter'd  elegance  decreed, 
"When  Britain's  mindful  vo:c?  shall  bend, 
And  with  her  own  thy  honours  blend, 
As  she  from  thy  kind  hands  receives 
Her  titles  drawn  on  Glory's  leave?, 
And  back  reflects  them  on  thy  name, 
Till  time  shall  love  thy  mounting  fame. 

Thus  was   Leland,   like   the   melancholic,    withdrawn 


270  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTIIORS. 

entirely  into  the  world  of  his  own  ideas  ;  his  imagination 
delighting  in  reveries,  while  his  industry  was  exhausting 
itself  in  labour.  His  manners  were  not  free  from 
haughtiness, — his  meagre  and  expressive  physiognomy 
indicates  the  melancholy  and  the  majesty  of  his  mind  ;  it 
was  not  old  age,  but  the  premature  wrinkles  of  those 
nightly  labours  he  has  himself  recorded.  All  these 
characteristics  are  so  strongly  marked  in  the  bust  of 
Leland,  that  Lavater  had  triumphed  had  he  studied 
it.* 

Labour  had  been  long  felt  as  voluptuousness  by  Leland ; 
and  this  is  among  the  Calamities  of  Literature,  and  it  is 
so  with  all  those  studies  which  deeply  busy  the  intellect 
and  the  fancy.  There  is  a  poignant  delight  in  study, 
often  subversive  of  human  happiness.  Men  of  genius, 
from  their  ideal  state,  drop  into  the  cold  formalities  of 
society,  to  encounter  its  evils,  its  disappointments,  its 
neglect,  and  perhaps  its  persecutions.  When  such  minds 
discover  the  world  will  only  become  a  friend  on  its  own 
terms,  then  the  cup  of  their  wrath  overflows ;  the  learned 
grow  morose,  and  the  witty  sarcastic;  but  more  indel- 
ible emotions  in  a  highly-excited  imagination  often  pro- 
duce those  delusions,  which  Darwin  calls  hallucinations, 
and  which  sometimes  terminate  in  mania.  The  haughti- 
ness, the  melancholy,  and  the  aspiring  genius  of  Leland, 
were   tending  to  a   disordered  intellect.      Incipient   in- 

*  What  reason  is  there  to  suppose  with  Granger  that  his  bust,  so 
admirably  engraven  by  G-riguion,  is  supposititious?  Probably  struck 
by  i lie  premature  old  a^re  of  a  man  who  died  in  his  fortieth  year,  he 
condemned  it  by  its  appearance;  but  not  with  the  eye  of  the  physiog- 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  271 

sanity  is  a  mote  floating  in  the  understanding,  escaping 
all  observation,  when  the  mind  is  capable  of  observing 
itself,  but  seems  a  constituent  part  of  the  mind  itself 
when  that  is  completely  covered  with  its  cloud. 

Leland  did  not  reach  even  the  maturity  of  life,  the 
period  at  which  his  stupendous  works  were  to  be  exe- 
cuted. He  was  seized  by  frenzy.  The  causes  of  his  insan- 
ity were  never  known.  The  Papists  declared  he  went 
mad  because  he  had  embraced  the  new  religion  ;  his 
malicious  rival  Polydore  Vergil,  because  he  had  prom- 
ised what  he  could  not  perform;  duller  prosaists  because 
his  poetical  turn  had  made  him  conceited.  The  grief 
and  melancholy  of  a  fine  genius,  and  perhaps  an  irregular 
pension,  his  enemies  have  not  noticed. 

The  ruins  of  Leland's  mind  were  viewed  in  his  library ; 
volumes  on  volumes  stupendously  heaped  together,  and 
masses  of  notes  scattered  here  and  there ;  all  the  vestiges 
of  his  genius,  and  its  distraction.  His  collections  were 
seized  on  by  honest  and  dishonest  hands;  many  were 
treasm*ed,  but  some  were  stolen.  Hearne  zealously  ar- 
ranged a  series  of  volumes  from  the  fragments ;  but  the 
"Britannia"  of  Camden,  the  "London"  of  Stowe,"  and 
the  "  Chronicles  "  of  Holinshed,  are  only  a  few  of  those 
public  works  whose  waters  silently  welled  from  the 
spring  of  Leland's  genius ;  and  that  nothing  might  be 
wanting  to  preserve  some  relic  of  that  fine  imagination 
which  was  always  working  in  his  poetic  soul,  his  own 
description  of  his  learned  journey  over  the  kingdom  was 
a  spark,  which,  falling  into  the  inflammable  mind  of  a 
poet,  produced  the  singular  and  patriotic  poem  of  the 


272  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

"Polyolbion"  of  Drayton.  Thus  the  genius  of  Leland 
has  come  to  us  diffused  through  a  variety  of  other  men's  • 
and  what  he  intended  to  produce  it  lias  required  many 
to  perform. 

A  singular  inscription,  in  which  Leland  speaks  of 
himself,  in  the  style  he  was  accustomed  to  use,  and 
which  Weever  tells  us  was  affixed  to  his  monument,  as 
he  had  heard  by  tradition,  was  probably  a  relic  snatched 
from  his  general  wreck — for  it  could  not  with  propriety 
have  been  composed  after  his  death.* 

Quantum  Rhenano  debet  Germania  docto 

Tantum  debebit  terra  Britanna  mihL 
Tile  suae  gentis  ritus  et  nomina  prisca 

^Estivo  fecit  lucidiora  die. 
Ipse  antiquarum  rerum  quoque  magnus  amator 

Ornabo  patrhe  lumina  clara  mese. 
Qure  cum  prodierint  niveis  inscripta  tabellis, 

Turn  testes  nostrse  seduiitatis  erunt. 

imitated. 
WTiat  Germany  to  learn'd  Rhenanus  owes, 
Tliat  for  my  Britain  shall  my  toil  unclose; 
His  volumes  mark  their  customs,  names,  and  climes, 
And  brighten,  with  a  summer's  light,  old  times. 
I  also,  touch'd  by  the  same  love,  will  write, 
To  ornament  my  country's  splendid  light, 
Which  shall,  inscribed  on  snowy  tablets,  bo  i 

Full  many  a  witness  of  my  industry. 

Another  example  of  literary  disappointment  disorder- 
ing the  intellect  may  be  contemplated  in  the  fate  of  the 
poet  Collins. 

Several  interesting  incidents  may  be  supplied  to  John- 
son's narrative  of  the  short  and  obscure  life  of  this  poet, 

*  AncieDt  Funerall  Monuments,  p.  692. 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  273 

who,  more  than  any  other  of  our  martyrs  to  the  lyre,  has 
thrown  over  all  his  images  and  his  thoughts  a  tenderness 
of  mind,  and  breathed  a  freshness  over  tho  pictures  of 
poetry,  which  the  mighty  Milton  has  not  exceeded,  and 
the  laborious  Gray  has  not  attained.  But  he  immolated 
happiness,  and  at  length  reason,  to  his  imagination ! 
The  incidents  most  interesting  in  the  life  of  Collins 
would  be  those  events  which  elude  the  ordinary  biog- 
rapher; that  invisible  train  of  emotions  which  were 
gradually  passing  in  his  mind ;  those  passions  which 
first  moulded  his  genius,  and  which  afterwards  broke  it ! 
But  who  could  record  the  vacillations  of  a  poetic  tem- 
per, its  early  hope  and  its  late  despair,  its  wild  gaiety 
and  its  settled  frenzy,  but  the  poet  himself?  Yet  Col- 
lins has  left  behind  no  memorial  of  the  wanderings  of 
his  alienated  mind  but  the  errors  of  his  life  ! 

At  college  he  published  his  "  Persian  Eclogues,"  as 
they  were  first  called,  to  which,  when  he  thought  they 
were  not  distinctly  Persian,  he  gave  the  more  general 
title  of  "  Oriental."  The  publication  was  attended  with 
no  success ;  but  the  first  misfortune  a  poet  meets  will 
rarely  deter  him  from  incurring  more.  He  suddenly 
quitted  the  university,  and  has  been  censured  for  not 
having  consulted  his  friends  when  he  rashly  resolved  to 
live  by  the  pen.  But  he  had  no  friends !  His  father 
had  died  in  embarrassed  circumstances  ;  and  Collins 
was  residing  at  the  university  on  the  stipend  allowed 
him  by  his  uncle,  Colonel  Martin,  who  was  abroad.  He 
was  indignant  at  a  repulse  he  met  with  at  college  ;  and 

alive  to  the  name  of  author  and  poet,  the  ardent  and 
18 


27-i  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

simple  youth  imagined  that  a  nobler  field  of  action 
opened  on  him  in  the  metropolis  than  was  presented  by 
the  flat  uniformity  of  a  collegiate  life.  To  whatever 
spot  the  youthful  poet  flies,  that  spot  seems  Parnassus, 
as  applause  seems  patronage.  lie  hurried  to  town,  and 
presented  himself  before  the  cousin  who  paid  his  small 
allowance  from  his  uncle  in  a  fashionable  dress  with  a 
feather  in  his  hat.  The  graver  gentleman  did  not  suc- 
ceed in  his  attempt  at  sending  him  back,  with  all  the 
terror  of  his  information,  that  Collins  had  not  a  single 
guinea  of  his  own,  and  was  dressed  in  a  coat  he  could 
never  pay  for.  The  young  bard  turned  from  his  obdu- 
rate cousin  as  "a  dull  fellow;"  a  usual  phrase  with  him 
to  describe  those  who  did  not  think  as  he  would  have 
them. 

That  moment  was  now  come,  so  much  desired,  and 
scarcely  yet  dreaded,  which  was  to  produce  those  effu- 
sions of  fancy  and  learning,  for  which  Collins  had  pre- 
pared himself  by  previous  studies.  About  this  time 
Johnson*  has  given  a  finer  picture  of  the  intellectual 
powers  and  the  literary  attainments  of  Collins  than  in 
the  life  he  afterwards  composed.  "  Collins  was  ac- 
quainted not  only  with  the  learned  tongues,  but  with 
the  Italian,  French,  and  Spanish  languages;  full  of  hopes 
and  full  of  projects,  versed  in  many  languages,  high 
in  fancy,  and  strong  in  retention."  Such  was  the  lan- 
guage of  Johnson,  when,  warmed  by  his  own  imagina- 
tion, he  could  write  like  Longinus ;  at  that  after-period, 
when  assuming  the  austerity  of  critical  discussion  for 
*  In  a  letter  to  Joseph  Warton. 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  275 

the  lives  of  poets,  even  in  the  coldness  of  his  recollec- 
tions, he  describes  Collins  as  "  a  man  of  extensive  litera- 
ture, and  of  vigorous  faculties." 

A  chasm  of  several  years  remains  to  be  filled.  He 
was  projecting  works  of  labour,  and  creating  productions 
of  taste ;  and  he  has  been  reproached  for  irresolution, 
and  even  for  indolence.  Let  us  catch  his  feelings  from 
the  facts  as  they  rise  together,  and  learn  whether  Col- 
lins must  endure  censure  or  excite  sympathy. 

When  he  was  living  loosely  about  town,  he  occa- 
sionally wrote  many  short  poems  in  the  house  of  a  friend, 
who  witnesses  that  he  burned  as  rapidly  as  he  com- 
posed. His  odes  were  purchased  by  Millar,  yet  though 
but  a  slight  pamphlet,  all  the  interest  of  that  great 
bookseller  could  never  introduce  them  into  notice.  Xot 
an  idle  compliment  is  recorded  to  have  been  sent  to  the 
poet.  When  we  now  consider  that  among  these  odes 
was  one  the  most  popular  in  the  language,  with  some 
of  the  most  exquisitely  poetical,  it  reminds  us  of  the 
difficulty  a  young  writer  without  connexions  experiences 
in  obtaining  the  public  ear ;  and  of  the  languor  of  poet- 
ical connoisseurs  who  sometimes  suffer  poems,  that  have 
not  yet  grown  up  to  authority,  to  be  buried  on  the  shelf. 
What  the  outraged  feelings  of  the  poet  were,  appeared 
when  some  time  afterwards  he  became  rich  enough  to  ex- 
press them.  Having  obtained  some  fortune  by  the  death 
of  his  uncle,  he  made  good  to  the  publisher  the  deficiency 
of  the  unsold  odes,  and,  in  his  haughty  resentment  at  the 
public  taste,  consigned  the  impression  to  the  flames  ! 

Who  shall  now  paint  the  feverish  and  delicate  feelings 


276  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

of  a  young  poet  such  as  Collins,  who  had  twice  addressed 
the  public,  and  twice  had  been  repulsed?  He  whose 
poetic  temper  Johnson  has  finely  painted,  at  the  happy 
moment  when  he  felt  its  influence,  as  "  delighting  to  rove 
through  the  meadows  of  enchantment,  to  gaze  on  the 
magnificence  of  golden  palaces,  and  repose  by  the  water- 
falls of  Elysian  gardens  !" 

It  cannot  be  doubted,  and  the  recorded  facts  will  de- 
monstrate it,  that  the  poetical  disappointments  of  Collins 
were  secretly  preying  on  his  spirit,  and  repressing  his 
firmest  exertions.  With  a  mind  richly  stored  with 
literature,  and  a  soul  alive  to  the  impulses  of  nature  and 
study,  he  projected  a  "  History  of  the  Revival  of  Learn- 
ing," and  a  translation  of  "  Aristotle's  Poetics,"  to  be 
illustrated  by  a  large  commentary. 

But  "  his  great  fault,"  says  Johnson,  "  was  his  irreso- 
lution ;  or  the  frequent  calls  of  immediate  necessity 
broke  his  schemes,  and  suffered  him  to  pursue  no  settled 
purpose."  Collins  was,  however,  not  idle,  though  with- 
out application  ;  for,  when  reproached  with  idleness  by  a 
friend,  he  showed  instantly  several  sheets  of  his  version 
of  Aristotle,  and  many  embryos  of  some  lives  he  had 
engaged  to  compose  for  the  "Biographia  Britannica  ;" 
he  never  brought  either  to  perfection  !  "What  then  was 
this  irresolution  but  the  vacillations  of  a  mind  broken 
and  confounded  ?  He  had  exercised  too  constantly  the 
highest  faculties  of  fiction,  and  he  had  precipitated  him- 
self into  the  dreariness  of  real  life.  None  but  a  poet  can 
conceive,  for  none  but  a  poet  can  experience,  the  secret 
wounds  inflicted  on  a  mind  of  romantic  fancy  and  tender- 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  277 

ness  of  emotion,  which  has  staked  its  happiness  on  its  im- 
agination ;  for  such  neglect  is  felt  as  ordinary  men  would 
feel  the  sensation  of  being  let  down  into  a  sepulchre,  and 
buried  alive.  The  mind  of  Tasso,  a  brother  in  fancy  to 
Collins,  became  disordered  by  the  opposition  of  the  crit- 
ics, but  perpetual  neglect  injures  it  not  less.  The  Hope 
of  the  ancients  was  represented  holding  some  flowers,  the 
promise  of  the  spring,  or  some  spikes  of  corn,  indicative  of 
approaching  harvest — but  the  Hope  of  Collins  had  scat- 
tered its  seed,  and  they  remained  buried  in  the  earth. 

The  oblivion  which  covered  our  poet's  works  appeared 
to  him  eternal,  as  those  works  now  seem  to  us  immortal. 
He  had  created  Hope  with  deep  and  enthusiastic  feel- 
ing!— 

With  eyes  so  fair — 
Whispering  promised  pleasure, 

And  bade  the  lovely  scenes  at  distance  hail ; 

And  Hope,  enchanted,  smiled,  and  waved  her  golden  hair  I 

The  few  years  Collins  passed  in  the  metropolis  he  was 
subsisting  with  or  upon  his  friends ;  and,  being  a  pleas- 
ing companion,  he  obtained  many  literary  acquaintances. 
It  was  at  this  period  that  Johnson  knew  him,  and  thus 
describes  him: — "His  appearance  was  decent,  and  his 
knowledge  considerable  ;  his  views  extensive,  and  his  con- 
versation elegant."  He  was  a  constant  frequenter  at  the 
literary  resorts  of  the  Bedford  and  Slaughter's;  and 
Armstrong,  Hill,  Garrick,  and  Foote,  frequently  con- 
sulted him  on  their  pieces  before  they  appeared  in  pub- 
lic. From  his  intimacy  with  Garrick  he  obtained  a  free 
admission  into  the  green-room ;  and  probably  it  was  at 
this  period,  among  his  other  projects,  that  he  planned 


273  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

several  tragedies,  which,  however,  as  Johnson  observes, 
"  he  only  planned."  There  is  a  feature  in  Collins's  char- 
acter which  requires  attention.  He  is  represented  as  a 
man  of  cheerful  dispositions ;  and  it  has  been  my  study 
to  detect  only  a  melancholy,  which  was  preying  on  the 
very  source  of  life  itself.  Collins  was,  indeed,  born  to 
charm  his  friends ;  for  fancy  and  elegance  were  never 
absent  from  his  susceptible  mind,  rich  in  its  stores,  and 
versatile  in  its  emotions.  He  himself  indicates  his  own 
character,  in  his  address  to  "  Home  :" — 

Go  !  nor,  regardless  while  these  numbers  boast 
My  short-lived  bliss,  forget  my  social  name. 

Johnson  has  told  us  of  his  cheerful  dispositions ;  and 
one  who  knew  him  Avell  observes,  that  "in  the  green- 
room he  made  diverting  observations  on  the  vanity  and 
false  consequence  of  that  class  of  people,  and  his  manner 
of  relating  them  to  his  particular  friends  was  extremely 
entertaining  :"  but  the  same  friend  acknowledges  that 
"some  letters  which  he  received  from  Collins,  though 
chiefly  on  business,  have  in  them  some  flights  which 
6trongly  mark  his  character,  and  for  which  reason  I  have 
preserved  them."  We  cannot  decide  of  the  temper  of  a 
man  viewed  only  in  a  circle  of  friends,  who  listen  to  the 
ebullitions  of  wit  or  fancy  ;  the  social  warmth  for  a  mo- 
ment throws  into  forgetfulness  his  secret  sorrow.  The 
most  melancholy  man  is  frequently  the  most  delightful 
companion,  and  peculiarly  endowed  with  the  talent  of 
satirical    playfulness    ami    vivacity    of    humour.*      But 

*  Burton,  the  author  of  "  The  Anatomy  of  Melancholy,"  offers  a 
etrxk.:jg  instance.     Bishop   Kennett,  in  his   curious   "  Register   and 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  279 

what  was  the  true  life  of  Collins,  separated  from  its  ad- 
ventitious circumstances?  It  was  a  life  of  want,  never 
chequered  by  hope,  that  was  striving  to  elude  its  own 
observation  by  hurrying  into  some  temporary  dissipa- 
tion. But  the  hours  of  melancholy  and  solitude  were 
sure  to  return  ;  these  were  marked  on  the  dial  of  his  life 
and,  when  they  struck,  the  gay  and  lively  Collins,  like  one 
of  his  own  enchanted  beings,  as  surely  relapsed  into  his 
natural  shape.  To  the  perpetual  recollection  of  his  poet 
ical  disappointments  are  we  to  attribute  this  unsettled 
state  of  his  mind,  and  the  perplexity  of  his  studies.  To 
these  he  was  perpetually  reverting,  which  he  showed 
when  after  a  lapse  of  several  years,  he  could  not  rest, 
till  he  had  burned  his  ill-fated  odes.  And  what  was  the 
result  of  his  literary  life?  He  returned  to  his  native 
city  of  Chichester  in  a  state  almost  of  nakedness,  desti- 
tute, diseased,  and  wild  in  despair,  to  hide  himself  in  the 
arms  of  a  sister. 


Chronicle,1'  has  preserved  the  following  particulars  of  this  author. 
"  In  an  interval  of  vapours  he  would  be  extremely  jileasant,  and  raise 
laughter  in  any  company.  Yet  I  have  heard  that  nothing  at  last  could 
make  him  laugh  but  going  down  to  the  Bridge-foot  at  Oxford,  and 
hearing  the  bargemen  scold  and  storm  and  swear  at  one  another ;  at 
which  he  would  set  his  hands  to  his  sides,  and  laugh  most  profusely ; 
yet  in  his  chamber  so  mute  and  mopish,  that  he  was  suspected  to  be 
fell  de  se."  "With  what  a  fine  strain  of  poetic  feeling  has  a  modern 
bard  touched  this  subject ! — 

"  As  a  beam  o'er  the  face  of  the  water3  may  glow, 
While  the  tide  runs  in  darkness  and  coldness  below, 
So  the  cheek  may  be  tinged  with  a  warm  sunny  smile, 
Though  the  cold  heart  to  ruin  runs  darkly  the  while." 

Mouke's  "Irish  Melodies." 


280  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

The  cloud  had  long  been  gathering  over  bis  convulsed 
intellect ;  and  the  fortune  he  acquired  on  the  death  of 
his  uncle  served  only  for  personal  indulgences,  which 
rather  accelerated  his  disorder.  There  were,  at  times, 
some  awful  pauses  in  the  alienation  of  his  mind — but  he 
had  withdrawn  it  from  study.  It  was  in  one  of  these 
intervals  that  Thomas  Wart  on  told  Johnson  that  when 
he  met  Collins  travelling,  he  took  up  a  book  the  poet 
carried  with  him,  from  curiosity,  to  see  what  companion 
a  man  of  letters  had  chosen — it  was  an  English  Testa- 
ment. "  I  have  but  one  book,"  said  Collins,  "  but  that 
is  the  best."  This  circumstance  is  recorded  on  his 
tomb. 

He  join'd  pure  faith  to  strong  poetic  powers, 
And  in  reviving  reason's  lucid  hours, 
Sought  on  one  book  his  troubled  mind  to  rest, 
And  rightly  deem'd  the  book  of  God  the  best 

At  Chichester,  tradition  has  preserved  some  striking 
and  affecting  occurrences  of  his  last  days ;  he  would 
haunt  the  aisles  and  cloisters  of  the  cathedral,  roving 
days  and  nights  together,  loving  their 

Dim  religious  light. 

And,  when  the  choristers  chanted  their  anthem,  the 
listening  and  bewildered  poet,  carried  out  of  himself  by  the 
solemn  strains,  and  his  own  too  susceptible  imagination, 
moaned  and  shrieked,  and  awoke  a  sadness  and  a  terror 
most  affecting  amid  religious  emotions;  their  friend, 
their  kinsman,  and  their  poet,  was  before  them,  an  awful 
image  of  human  misery  and  ruined  genius  ! 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  281 

This  interesting  circumstance  is  thus  alluded  to  on  his 
monument : — 

Te  walls  that  echoed  to  his  frantic  moan, 
Guard  the  due  record  of  this  grateful  stone: 
Strangers  to  him,  enamour'd  of  his  lays, 
This  fond  memorial  of  his  talents  raise. 

A  voluntary  subscription  raised  the  monument  to 
Collins.  The  genius  of  Flaxman  has  thrown  out  on  the 
eloquent  marble  all  that  fancy  would  consecrate ;  the 
tomb  is  itself  a  poem. 

There  Collins  is  represented  as  sitting  in  a  reclining 
posture,  during  a  lucid  interval  of  his  afflicting  malady, 
with  a  calm  and  benign  aspect,  as  if  seeking  refuge  from 
his  misfortunes  in  the  consolations  of  the  Gospel,  which 
lie  open  before  him,  whilst  his  lyre,  and  "  The  Ode  on 
the  Passions,"  as  a  scroll,  are  thrown  together  neglected 
on  the  ground.  Upon  the  pediment  on  the  tablet  are 
placed  in  relief  two  female  figures  of  Love  and  Pity, 
entwined  each  in  the  arms  of  the  other;  the  proper 
emblems  of  the  genius  of  his  poetry. 

Langhorne,  who  gave  an  edition  of  Collins's  poems 
with  all  the  fervour  of  a  votary,  made  an  observation 
not  perfectly  correct: — "  It  is  observable,"  he  says,  "  that 
none  of  his  poems  bear  the  marks  of  an  amorous  disposi- 
tion ;  and  that  he  is  one  of  those  few  poets  who  have 
sailed  to  Delphi  without  touching  at  Cythera.  In  the 
'  Ode  to  the  Passions,'  Love  has  been  omitted."  There, 
indeed,  Love  does  not  form  an  important  personage ;  yet, 
at  the  close,  Love  makes  his  transient  appearance  with 
Joy  and  Mirth — "  a  gay  fantastic  round." 


2S2  CALAMITIES   Oi1   AUTHORS. 

And.  amidst  his  frolic  play, 

As  if  he  would  the  charming  air  repay, 

Shook  thousand  odours  from  his  dewy  wings. 

It  is  certain,  however,  that  Collins  consideied  the 
amatory-  passion  as  unfriendly  to  poetic  originality ;  for 
he  alludes  to  the  whole  race  of  the  Provencal  poets,  by 
accusing  them  of  only  employing 

Love,  only  love,  her  forceless  numbers  mean. 

Collins  affected  to  slight  the  urchin;  for  he  himself 
had  been  once  in  love,  and  his  wit  has  preserved  the 
history  of  his  passion ;  he  was  attached  to  a  young  lady 
who  was  born  the  day  before  him,  and  who  seems  not  to 
have  been  very  poetically  tempered,  for  she  did  not 
return  his  ardour.  On  that  occasion  he  said  "that  he 
came  into  the  world  a  day  after  the  fair.'''' 

Langhorne  composed  two  sonnets,  which  seem  only 
preserved  in  the  "  Monthly  Review,"  in  which  he  was  a 
writer,  and  where  he  probably  inserted  them  ;  they  bear 
a  particular  reference  to  the  misfortunes  of  our  poet.  In 
one  he  represents  Wisdom,  in  the  form  of  Addison, 
reclining  in  "  the  old  and  honoured  shade  of  Magdalen," 
and  thus  addressing 

The  poor  shade  of  Collins,  wandering  by; 

The  tear  stood  trembling  in  his  gentle  eye. 

"With  modest  grief  reluctant,  while  he  said — 

"Sweet  bard,  bolov'd  by  every  muse  in  vain  I 

"With  pow'rs,  whose  fineness  wrought  their  own  decay; 

Ah!  wherefore,  thoughtless,  didst  thou  yield  tho  rein 

To  fancy's  will,  and  chase  the  meteor  ray? 
Ahl  why  forget  thy  own  Hyblsean  strain, 
Peace  rules  the  breast,  where  Reason  rules  the  day." 


LITERARY    DISAPPOINTMENTS.  283 

The  last  line  is  most  happily  applied  ;  it  is  a  verse  by 
the  unfortunate  bard  himself,  which  heightens  the  con- 
trast with  his  forlorn  state  !  Langhorne  has  feelingly 
painted  the  fatal  indulgences  of  such  a  character  as 
Collins. 

Of  fancy's  too  prevailing  power  beware  I 
Oft  has  she  bright  on  life's  fair  morning  shone; 
Oft  seated  Hope  on  Reason's  sovereign  throne, 

Then  closed  the  scene,  in  darkness  and  despair. 
Of  all  her  gifts,  of  all  her  powers  possest, 
Let  not  her  flattery  win  thy  youthful  ear, 

Nor  vow  long  faith  to  such  a  various  guest, 
False  at  the  last  tho'  now  perchance  full  dear ; 

The  casual  lover  with  her  charms  is  blest, 
But  woe  to  them  her  magic  bands  that  wearl 

The  criticism  of  Johnson  on  the  poetry  of  Collins,  that 
"  as  men  are  often  esteemed  who  cannot  be  loved,  so  the 
poetry  of  Collins  may  sometimes  extort  praise  when  it 
gives  little  pleasure,"  might  almost  have  been  furnished 
by  the  lumbering  pen  of  old  Dennis.  But  Collins  from 
the  poetical  never  extorts  praise,  for  it  is  given  spontane- 
ously ;  he  is  much  more  loved  than  esteemed,  for  he  does 
not  give  little  pleasure.  Johnson,  too,  describes  his 
"  lines  as  of  slow  motion,  clogged  and  impeded  with 
clusters  of  consonants."  Even  this  verbal  criticism, 
though  it  appeals  to  the  eye,  and  not  to  the  ear,  is  false 
criticism,  since  Collins  is  certainly  the  most  musical  of 
poets.  How  could  that  lyrist  be  harsh  in  his  diction, 
who  almost  draws  tears  from  our  eyes,  while  his  melodi- 
ous lines  and  picturing  epithets  are  remembered  by  his 
readers  ?  He  is  devoured  Avith  as  much  enthusiasm  by 
one  party  as  he  is  imperfectly  relished  by  the  other. 


2S4:  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

Johnson  has  given  two  characters  of  this  poet ;  the  one 
composed  at  a  period  when  that  great  critic  was  still 
susceptible  of  the  seduction  of  the  imagination  ;  but  even 
in  this  portrait,  though  some  features  of  the  poet  are 
impressively  drawn,  the  likeness  is  incomplete,  for  there 
is  not  even  a  slight  indication  of  the  chief  feature  in 
Collins's  genius,  his  tenderness  and  delicacy  of  emotion, 
and  his  fresh  and  picturesque  creative  strokes.  Nature 
had  denied  to  Johnson's  robust  intellect  the  perception 
of  these  poetic  qualities.  He  was  but  a  stately  ox  in  the 
fields  of  Parnassus,  not  the  animal  of  nature.  Many 
years  afterwards,  during  his  poetical  biography,  that 
long  Lent  of  criticism,  in  which  he  mortified  our  poetical 
feeling  by  accommodating  his  to  the  populace  of  critics — 
so  faint  were  former  recollections,  and  so  imperfect  were 
even  those  feelings  which  once  he  seemed  to  have  pos- 
g<  ssed — that  he  could  then  do  nothing  but  write  on 
Collins  with  much  less  warmth  than  he  has  written  on 
Blackmore.  Johnson  is,  indeed,  the  first  of  critics,  when 
his  powerful  logic  investigates  objects  submitted  to 
reason  ;  but  great  sense  is  not  always  combined  with 
delicacy  of  taste ;  and  there  is  in  poetry  a  province 
which  Aristotle  himself  may  never  have  entered. 


THE  REWARDS  OF  ORIENTAL  STUDENTS. 

A  T  a  time  when  oriental  studies  were  in  their  infancy 
-^-*-  in  this  country,  Simon  Ockley,  animated  by  the 
illustrious  example  of  Pococke  and  the  laborious  diligence 


THE    REWARDS    OF    ORIENTAL    STUDENTS.      285 

of  Prideaux,  devoted  his  life  and  his  fortune  to  these  novel 
researches,  which  nccssirily  involved  bo. h.  With  that 
enthusiasm  which  the  ancient  votary  experienced,  and 
with  that  patient  suffering  the  modern  martyr  lias  en- 
dured, he  pursued,  till  he  accomplished,  the  useful  object 
of  his  labours.  He,  perhaps,  was  the  first  who  exhibited 
to  us  other  heroes  than  those  of  Rome  and  Greece ; 
sages  as  contemplative,  and  a  people  more  magnificent 
even  than  the  iron  masters  of  the  world.  Among  oth- 
er oriental  productions,  his  most  considerable  is  "  The 
History  of  the  Saracens."  The  first  volume  appeared  in 
1708,  and  the  second  ten  years  afterwards.  In  the 
preface  to  the  last  volume,  the  oriental  student  patheti- 
cally counts  over  his  sorrows,  and  triumphs  over  his 
disappointments  ;  the  most  remarkable  part  is  the  date 
of  the  place  from  whence  this  preface  was  written — he 
triumphantly  closes  his  labours  in  the  confinement  of 
Cambridge  Castle  for  debt ! 

Ockley,  lamenting  his  small  proficiency  in  the  Persian 
studies,  resolves  to  attain  to  them — 

"  How  often  have  I  endeavoured  to  perfect  myself  in 
that  language,  but  my  malignant  and  envious  stars  still 
frustrated  my  attempts  ;  but  they  shall  sooner  alter  their 
courses  than  extinguish  my  resolution  of  quenching  that 
thirst  which  the  little  1  have  had  of  it  hath  already 
excited." 

And  lie  states  the  deficiencies  of  his  history  with  tho 
most  natural  modesty — 

"  Had  I  not  been  forced  to  snatch  everything  that  I 
have,  as  it  were,  out  of  the  fire,  our   Saracen  history 


236  CALAMITIES  OF  AUTHORS. 

should  have  been  ushered  into  the  world  after  a  different 
manner."  He  is  fearful  that  something  would  be  ascribed 
to  his  indolence  or  negligence,  that  "  ought  more  justly  to 
be  attributed  to  the  influence  of  inexorable  necessity, 
could  I  have  been  master  of  my  own  time  and  circum- 
stances." 

Shame  on  those  pretended  patrons  who,  appointing  "  a 
professor  of  the  oriental  languages,"  counteract  the  pur- 
pose of  the  professorship  by  their  utter  neglect  of  the 
professor,  whose  stipend  cannot  keep  him  on  the  spot 
where  only  he  ought  to  dwell.  And  Ockley  complains 
also  of  that  hypocritical  curiosity  which  pretends  to  take 
an  interest  in  things  it  cares  little  about ;  perpetually  in- 
quiring, as  soon  as  a  work  is  announced,  when  it  is  to 
come  out.  But  these  Pharisees  of  literature,  who  can 
only  build  sepulchres  to  ancient  prophets,  never  believe 
in  a  living  one.  Some  of  these  Ockley  met  with  on  the 
publication  of  his  first  volume  :  they  run  it  down  as  the 
strangest  story  they  had  ever  heard  ;  they  had  never 
met  with  such  folks  as  the  Arabians !  "  A  reverend  dig 
nitary  asked  me  if,  when  I  wrote  that  book,  I  had  not 
lately  been  reading  the  history  of  Oliver  Cromwell  ?" 
Such  was  the  plaudit  the  oriental  student  received,  and 
returned  to  grow  pale  over  his  MSS.  But  when  Petis  de 
la  Croix,  observes  Ockley,  was  pursuing  the  same  track 
U'ly.in  the  patronage  of  Louis  XIV.,  he  found  books, 
leisure,  and  encouragement  ;  and  when  the  great  Colbert 
ired  him  to  compose  the  life  of  Genkis  Chan,  he  con- 
sidered a  period  often  years  no1  too  much  to  be  allowed 
the  author.     And  then  Ockley  proceeds — 


THE   REWARDS   OF   ORIENTAL   STUDENTS.         2S7 

"  But  my  unhappy  condition  hath  always  been  widely 
different  from  anything  that  could  admit  of  such  an  ex- 
actness. Fortune  seems  only  to  have  given  me  a  taste 
of  it  out  of  spite,  on  purpose  that  I  might  regret  the  loss 
of  it." 

He  describes  his  two  journeys  to  Oxford,  for  his  first 
volume ;  but  in  his  second,  matters  fared  worse  with 
him — 

"  Either  my  domestic  affairs  wTere  grown  much  worse, 
or  I  less  able  to  bear  them  ;  or  what  is  more  probable, 
both." 

Ingenuous  confession !  fruits  of  a  life  devoted  in  its 
struggles  to  important  literature  !  and  we  murmur  when 
genius  is  irritable,  and  erudition  is  morose !  But  let  us 
proceed  with  Ockley : — 

"  I  was  forced  to  take  the  advantage  of  the  slumber  of 
my  cares,  that  never  slept  when  I  was  awake ;  and  if  they 
did  not  incessantly  interrupt  my  studies,  were  sure  to 
succeed  them  with  no  less  constancy  than  night  doth  the 
day." 

This  is  the  cry  of  agony.  He  who  reads  this  without 
sympathy,  ought  to  reject  these  volumes  as  the  idlest  he 
ever  read,  and  honour  me  with  his  contempt.  The  close 
of  Ockley's  preface  shows  a  love-like  tenderness  for  his 
studies ;  although  he  must  quit  life  without  bringing 
them  to  perfection,  he  opens  his  soul  to  posterity  and  tells 
them,  in  the  language  of  prophecy,  that  if  they  will  be- 
stow encouragement  on  our  youth,  the  misfortunes  he  has 
described  will  be  remedied.  He,  indeed,  was  aware  that 
these  students — 


238  CALAMITIES   OF   ATJTriORS. 

"  Will  hardly  come  in  upon  the  prospect  of  finding 
leisure,  in  a  prison,  to  transcribe  those  papers  for  the 
press  which  they  have  collected  with  indefatigable  labour, 
and  oftentimes  at  the  expense  of  their  rest,  and  all  the 
other  conveniences  of  life,  for  the  service  of  the  public." 

Yet  the  exuding  martyr  of  literature,  at  the  moment 
he  is  fast  bound  to  the  stake,  does  not  consider  a  prison 
so  dreadful  a  reward  for  literary  labours — 

"  I  can  assure  them,  from  my  own  experience,  that  I 
have  enjoyed  more  true  liberty,  more  happy  leisure,  and 
more  solid  repose  in  six  months  here,  than  in  thrice  the 
same  number  of  years  before.  Evil  is  the  condition  of 
that  historian  who  undertakes  to  write  the  lives  of  others 
before  he  knows  how  to  live  himself.  Yet  I  have  no  just 
reason  to  be  angry  with  the  world  ;  I  never  stood  in  need 
of  its  assistance  in  my  life,  but  I  found  it  always  very 
liberal  of  its  advice  ;  for  which  I  am  so  much  the  more 
beholden  to  it,  by  how  much  the  more  I  did  always  in 
my  judgment  give  the  possession  of  wisdom  the  pref- 
erence to  that  of  riches."* 

*  Dr.  Edmund  Castell  offers  a  remarkable  instance  to  illustrate  our 
present  investigation.  He  more  than  devoted  his  life  to  his  "  Lexicon 
Heptaglotton."  It  is  not  possible,  if  there  are  tears  that  are  to  be 
bestowed  on  the  afflictions  of  learned  men,  to  read  his  pathetic  address 
to  Charles  II.,  and  forbear.  He  laments  the  seventeen  years  of  in- 
credible pains,  duiing  which  he  thought  himself  idle  when  he  had  not 
devoted  sixteen  or  eighteen  hours  a  day  to  this  labour;  that  he  had 
expended  all  his  inheritance  (it  is  said  more  than  twelve  thousand 
pounds);  that  it  had  broken  his  constitution,  and  left  him  bliud  aa 
well  as  po  r.  "When  this  invaluable  Polyglott  was  published,  the 
copies  remained  unsold  in  his  hands;  for  the  learned  Castell  had  an- 
ticipated the  curiosity  and  knowledge  of  the  public  by  a  full  century. 
Re  had  so  completely  devoted  himself  to  oriental  stu  ies.  that  they  had 


THE   REWARDS   OF   ORIENTAL   STUDENTS.         289 

Poor  Ockley,  always  a  student,  and  rarely  what  is 
called  a  man  of  the  world,  once  encountered  a  literary 
calamity  which  frequently  occurs  when  an  author  finds 
himself  among  the  vapid  triflers  and  the  polished  cynics 
of  the  fashionable  circle.  Something  like  a  patron  he 
found  in  Harley,  the  Earl  of  Oxford,  and  once  had  the 
unlucky  honour  of  dining  at  the  table  of  my  Lord  Trea- 
surer. It  is  probable  that  Ockley,  from  retired  habits 
and  severe  studies,  was  not  at  all  accomplished  in 
the  suaviter  in  modo,  of  which  greater  geniuses  than 
Ockley  have  so  surlily  despaired.  How  he  behaved  I 
cannot  narrate  :  probably  he  delivered  himself  with  as 
great  simplicity  at  the  table  of  the  Lord  Treasurer  as  on 
the  wrong  side  of  Cambi-idge  Castle  gate.  The  embar- 
rassment this  simplicity  drew  him  into  is  very  fully  stated 
in  the  following  copious  apology  he  addressed  to  the 
Earl  of  Oxford,  which  I  have  transcribed  from  the  origi- 

a  very  remarkable  consequence,  for  he  had  totally  forgotten  his  own 
language,  and  could  scarcely  spell  a  single  word.  This  appears 
in  some  of  his  English  Letters,  preserved  by  Mr.  Nichols  in  hi3 
valuable  "Literary  Anecdotes  of  the  Eighteenth  Century,"  vol.  iv. 
Five  hundred  of  these  Lexicons,  unsold  at  the  time  of  his  death,  were 
placed  by  Dr.  Castell's  niece  in  a  room  so  little  regarded,  that  scarcely 
one  compk  te  copy  escaped  the  rats,  and  "  the  whole  load  of  learned  rags 
sold  only  for  seven  pounds."  The  work  at  this  moment  would  find 
purchasers,  I  believe,  at  forty  or  fifty  pounds. — The  learned  Sale, 
who  first  gave  the  world  a  genuine  version  of  the  Koran,  and  who  had 
so  zealously  laboured  in  forming  that  "Universal  History  "  which  was 
the  pride  of  our  country,  pursued  his  studies  through  a  life  of  want — 
and  this  great  orientalist  (I  grieve  to  degrade  the  memoirs  of  a  man 
of  learning  by  such  mortifications),  when  he  quitted  his  studies  too 
often  wanted  a  change  of  linen,  and  often  wandered  in  the  streets  in 
search  of  some  compassionate  friend  who  would  supply  him  with  the 
meal  of  the  day  I 
19 


290  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

nal ;  perhaps  it  may  he  a  useful  memorial  to  some  men 
of  letters  as  little  polished  as  the  learned  Ockley: — 

"  Cambridge.  July  15.  1714. 

"Mt  Lord, — I  was  so  struck  with  horror  and  amaze- 
ment two  days  ago,  that  I  cannot  possibly  express  it.  A 
friend  of  mine  showed  me  a  letter,  part  of  the  contents 
of  winch  were,  '  That  Professor  Ockley  had  given  such 
extreme  offence  by  some  tmcourtly  answers  to  some  gen- 
tlemen at  my  Lord  Treasurer's  table  that  it  would  be  in 
vain  to  make  any  further  application  to  him.' 

"My  Lord,  it  is  impossible  for  me  to  recollect,  at  this 
distance  of  time.  All  that  I  can  say  is  this :  that,  as  on 
the  one  side  for  a  man  to  come  to  his  patron's  table  with 
a  design  to  affront  either  him  or  his  friends  supposes  him 
a  perfect  natural,  a  mere  idiot ;  so  on  the  other  side  it 
would  be  extreme  severe,  if  a  person  whose  education 
was  far  distant  from  the  politeness  of  a  court,  should, 
upon  the  account  of  an  unguarded  expression,  or  some 
little  inadvertency  in  his  behaviour,  suffer  a  capital 
sentence. 

••  Which  is  my  case,  if  I  have  forfeited  your  Lordship's 
favour;  which  God  forbid!  That  man  is  involved  in 
double  ruin  that  is  not  only  forsaken  by  his  friend,  but, 
which  is  the  unavoidable  consequence,  exposed  to  the 
malice  and  contempt  not  only  of  enemies,  but,  what  is 
still  more  grievous,  of  all  sorts  of  fools. 

"It  is  not  tin-  talent  of  every  well-meaning  man  to 
converse  with  his  superiors  with  due  decorum  ;  for, 
either  when  he  reflects  upon  the  vast  distance  of  their 


THE   REWARDS   OF   ORIENTAL  STUDENTS.        201 

station  above' his  own,  he  is  struck  dumb  and  almost  in- 
sensible; or  else  their  condescension  and  courtly  beha- 
viour encourages  him  to  be  too  familiar.  To  steer 
exactly  between  these  two  extremes  requires  not  only  a 
good  intention,  but  presence  of  mind,  and  long  custom. 

"  Another  article  in  my  friend's  letter  was,  '  That 
somebody  had  informed  your  Lordship  that  I  was  a  very 
sot.'  When  first  I  had  the  honour  to  be  known  to  your 
Lordship,  I  could  easily  foresee  that  there  would  be  per- 
sons enough  that  would  envy  me  upon  that  account,  and 
do  what  in  them  lay  to  traduce  me.  Let  Haman  enjoy 
never  so  much  himself,  it  is  all  nothing,  it  does  him  no 
good,  till  poor  Mordecai  is  hanged  out  of  his  way. 

"  But  I  never  feared  the  being  censured  upon  that 
account.  Here  in  the  University  I  converse  with  none 
but  persons  of  the  most  distinguished  reputations  both 
for  learning  and  virtue,  and  receive  from  them  daily  as 
great  marks  of  respect  and  esteem,  which  I  should  not 
have  if  that  imputation  were  true.  It  is  most  certain 
that  I  do  indulge  myself  the  freedom  of  drinking  a 
cheerful  cup,  at  proper  seasons,  among  my  friends  ;  but 
no  otherwise  than  is  done  by  thousands  of  honest  men, 
who  never  forfeit  their  character  by  it.  And  whoever 
doth  no  more  than  so,  deserves  no  more  to  be  called  a 
sot,  than  a  man  that  eats  a  hearty  meal  would  be  willing 
to  be  called  a  glutton. 

"  As  for  those  detractors,  if  I  have  but  the  least  assur- 
ance of  your  Lordship's  favour,  I  can  very  easily  despise 
them.  They  are  Nati  consumere  fmges.  They  need 
not   trouble   themselves   about  what   other  people  do; 


292  CALAMITIES  0?  AUTHORS. 

for  whatever  they  cat  and  drink,  it  is  only  robbing  the 
poor.  Resigning  myself  entirely  to  your  Lordship's 
goodness  and  pardon,  I  conclude  this  necessary  apology 
with  like  provocation.  That  I  would  be  content  he 
should  take  my  character  from  any  person  that  had  a 
good  one  of  his  own. 

"I  am,  with  all  submission,  My  Lord, 

"  Your  Lordship's  nrost  obedient,  &c, 

"  Simon  Ocklet." 

To  the  honour  of  the  Earl  of  Oxford,  this  unlucky 
piece  of  awkwardness  at  table,  in  giving  "  uncourtly 
answers,"   did   not   interrupt   his   regard   for   the   poor 

oriental  student ;  for  several  years  afterwards  the  cor- 
respondence of  Ockley  was  still  acceptable  to  the  Earl. 

If  the  letters  of  the  widows  and  children  of  many  of 
our  eminent  authors  were  collected,  they  would  demon- 
strate the  great  fact,  that  the  man  who  is  a  husband 
or  a  father  ought  not  to  be  an  author.  They  might 
weary  with  a  monotonous  cry,  and  usually  would  be 
dated  from  the  gaol  or  the  garret.  I  have  seen  an 
original  letter  from  the  widow  of  Ockley  to  the  Earl 
of  Oxford,  in  which  she  lays  before  him  the  deplorable 
situation  of  her  affairs  ;  the  debts  of  the  Professor  being 
beyond  what  his  effects  amounted  to,  the  severity  of  the 
creditors  would  not  even  sutler  the  executor  to  make 
the  best  of  his  effects;  the  widow  remained  destitute 
of  necessaries,  incapable  of  assisting  her  children.* 

*  The  following  are  extracts  from  Ockley's  letters  to  the  Karl  of 
Oxford,  wiiicli  I  copy  from  the  ori^iuxls  : — 


THE   REWARDS   OF   ORIENTAL   STUDENTS.        293 

Thus  students  have  devoted  their  days  to  studies 
worthy  of  a  student.  They  are  public  benefactors,  yet 
find  no  friend  in  the  public,  who  cannot  yet  appreciate 
their  value — Ministers  of  State  know  it,  though  they 
have  rarely  protected  them.  Ockley,  by  letters  I  have 
seen,  wTas  frequently  employed  by  Bolingbroke  to  trans- 
late letters  from  the  Sovereign  of  Morocco  to  our  court ; 
yet  all  the  debts  for  which  he  was  imprisoned  in  Cam- 
bridge Castle  did  not  exceed  two  hundred  pounds.  The 
public  interest  is  concerned  in  stimulating  such  enthu- 
siasts ;  they  are  men  who  cannot  be  salaried,  who  cannot 
be  created  by  letters-patent  ;  for  they  are  men  who 
infuse  their  soul  into  their  studies,  and  breathe  their 
fondness  for  them  in  their  last  agonies.  Yet  such  are 
doomed  to  feel  their  life  pass  away  like  a  painful  dream ! 

Those  who  know  the  value  of  Lightfoot's  Hebraic 
studies,  may  be  startled  at  the  impediments  which  seem 
to  have  annihilated  them.  In  the  following  effusion  he 
confides  his  secret  agitation  to  his  friend  Buxtorf :  "  A 
few  years  since  I  prepared  a  little  commentary  on  the 
First  Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  in  the  same  style  and 
manner  as  I  had  done  that  on  Matthew.     But  it  laid  by 

"  Cambridge  Castle,  May  2,  1717. 
"I  am  here  in  the  prison  for  debt,  which  must  needs  be  an  un- 
avoidable consequence  of  the  distractions  in  my  family.     I  enjoy  more 
repose,  indeed,  here,  than  I  have  tasted  these  many  years,  but  tho 
circumstance  of  a  family  obliges  me  to  go  out  as  soon  as  I  can." 

"  Cambridge,  Sept.  7,  1717. 
"  I  have  at  last  found  leisure  in  my  confinement  to  finish  my  Saracen 
history,  which  I  might  have  hoped  for  in  vain  in  my  perplexed  circum- 
etances." 


294:  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

me  two  years  or  more,  nor  can  I  now  publish  it,  but  at 
my  own  charges,  and  to  my  great  damage,  which  I  felt 
enough  and  too  much  in  the  edition  of  my  book  upon 
Mark.  Some  progress  I  have  made  in  the  gospel  of  St. 
Luke,  but  I  can  print  nothing  but  at  my  own  cost : 
tbereupon  I  wholly  give  myself  to  reading,  scarce  think- 
ing of  writing  more;  for  booksellers  and  printers  have 
dulled  my  edge,  who  will  print  no  book,  especially 
Latin,  unless  they  have  an  assured  and  considerable 
gain." 

These  writings  and  even  the  fragments  have  been 
justly  appreciated  by  posterity,  and  a  recent  edition  of 
all  Lightfoot's  works  in  many  volumes  have  received 
honours  which  their  despairing  author  never  contem- 
plated. 


DANGER    INCURRED    BY   GIVING    THE   RE- 
SULT  OF   LITERARY  INQUIRIES. 

A    X  author  occupies  a  critical  situation,  for,  while  he 

is   presenting   the   world  with   the   result   of  his 

profound  studies  and  his  honest  inquiries,  it  may  prove 

pernicious  to  himself.     By  it  he  may  incur  the  risk  uf 

offending  the  higher  powers,  and  witnessing  his  own 

•    embittered.      Liable,    by    his    moderation   or   his 

discoveries,    by   his   scruples    <<v   his   assertions,  by   his 

adherence  to  truth,  or  by  the  curiosity  of  his  specula- 

.   to  be  persecuted  by  two  opposite   parties,  even 

when  the  accusations  of  the  one  necessarily  nullify  the 

other  ;  such  an  author  will  be  fortunate  to  be  permitted 


THE   RESULT   OF   LITERARY   INQUIRIES.  295 

to  retire  out  of  the  circle  of  the  bad  passions;  but  lie 
crushes  in  silence  and  voluntary  obscurity  all  future 
efforts — and  thus  the  nation  loses  a  valued  author. 

This  case  is  exemplified  by  the  history  of  Dr.  dowel's 
curious  work  "  The  Interpreter."  The  book  itself  is  a 
treasure  of  our  antiquities,  illustrating  our  national 
manners.  The  author  was  devoted  to  his  studies,  and 
the  merits  of  his  work  recommended  him  to  the  Arch- 
bishop of  Canterbury ;  in  the  Ecclesiastical  Court  he 
practised  as  a  civilian,  and  became  there  eminent  as  a 
judge.* 

Cowel  gave  his  work  with  all  the  modesty  of  true 
learning  ;  for  who  knows  his  deficiencies  so  well  in  ths 
subject  on  which  he  has  written  as  that  author  who 
knows  most  ?  It  is  delightful  to  listen  to  the  simplicity 
and  force  with  which  an  author  in  the  reign  of  our  first 
James  opens  himself  without  reserve. 

"  My  true  end  is  the  advancement  of  knowledge ;  and 
therefore  have  I  published  this  poor  work,  not  only  to 
impart  the  good  thereof  to  those  young  ones  that  want 
it,  but  also  to  draw  from  the  learned  the  supply  of 
my  defects.  Whosoever  will  charge  these  my  travels 
[labours]  with  many  oversights,  he  shall  need  no  solemn 

*  Cowers  book,  "The  Interpreter,"  though  professedly  a  mere 
explanation  of  law  terms,  was  believed  to  contain  allusions  or  inter- 
pretations of  law  entirely  adapted  to  party  feeling.  Cowel  was  blamed 
by  both  parties,  and  his  book  declared  to  infringe  the  royal  prerogative 
or  the  liberties  of  the  subject.  It  was  made  one  of  the  articles  against 
Laud  at  his  trial,  that  he  had  sanctioned  a  new  editicn  of  this  wo.  k 
to  countenance  King  Charles  in  his  measures.  Cowel  had  died  long 
before  this  (October,  1611);  he  had  retired  again  to  collegiate  life  as 
soon  as  he  got  free  of  his  political  persecutions. — Ed. 


296  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

pains  to  prove  thorn.  And  upon  the  view  taken  of  this 
book  sithence  the  impression,  I  dare  assure  them  that 
shall  observe  most  faults  therein,  that  I,  by  gleaning 
after  him,  will  gather  as  many  omitted  by  him,  as  he 
shall  show  committed  by  me.  What  a  man  saith  well 
is  not,  however,  to  be  rejected  because  he  hath  some 
errors ;  reprehend  who  will,  in  God's  name,  that  is,  with 
sweetness  and  without  reproach.  So  shall  he  reap 
hearty  thanks  at  my  hands,  and  thus  more  soundly  help 
in  a  few  months,  than  I,  by  tossing  and  tumbling  my 
books  at  home,  could  possibly  have  done  in  many  years." 

This  extract  discovers  Cowel's  amiable  character  as  an 
author.  But  he  was  not  fated  to  receive  "  sweetness 
without  reproach." 

Cowel  encountered  an  unrelenting  enemy  in  Sir  Ed- 
ward Coke,  the  famous  Attorney-General  of  James  I., 
the  commentator  of  Littleton.  As  a  man,  his  name 
ought  to  arouse  our  indignation,  for  his  licentious 
tongue,  his  fierce  brutality,  and  his  cold  and  tasteless 
genius.  He  whose  vileness  could  even  ruffle  the  great 
spirit  of  liawlcigh,  was  the  shameless  persecutor  of  the 
learned  Cowel. 

Coke  was  the  oracle  of  the  common  law,  and  Cowel 
of  the  civil;  but  Cowel  practised  at  Westminster  Hull 
as  well  as  at  Doctors'  Commons.  Coke  turned  away 
with  hatred  from  an  advocate  who,  with  the  skill  of  a 
great  lawyer,  exerted  all  the  courage.  The  Attorney- 
General  sought  every  occasion  to  degrade  him,  and, 
with  puerile  derision,  attempted  to  l';t-ten  on  Dr.  Cowel 
the   nickname   of   Dr.    Cowhed.      Coke,    alter    having 


TIIE   RESULT   OF   LITERARY   INQUIRIES.  9Q7 

written  in  his  "Reports"  whatever  he  could  against  our 
author,  with  no  effect,  started  a  new  project.  Coke  well 
knew  his  master's  jealousy  on  the  question  of  his  pre- 
rogative ;  and  he  touched  the  King  on  that  nerve.  The 
Attorney-General  suggested  to  James  that  Cowel  had 
discussed  "  too  nicely  the  mysteries  of  his  monarchy,  in 
some  points  derogatory  to  the  supreme  power  of  his 
crown  ;  asserting  that  the  royal  prerogative  was  in  some 
cases  limited."  So  subtly  the  serpent  whispered  to  the 
feminine  ear  of  a  monarch,  whom  this  vanity  of  royalty 
startled  with  all  the  fears  of  a  woman.  This  suggestion 
had  nearly  occasioned  the  ruin  of  Cowel — it  verged  on 
treason ;  and  if  the  conspiracy  of  Coke  now  failed,  it 
was  through  the  mediation  of  the  archbishop,  who 
influenced  the  King ;  but  it  succeeded  in  alienating  the 
royal  favour  from  Cowel. 

When  Coke  found  he  could  not  hang  Cowel  for  treason, 
it  was  only  a  small  disappointment,  for  he  had  hopes  to 
secure  his  prey  by  involving  him  in  felony.  As  physi- 
cians in  desperate  cases  sometimes  reverse  their  mode  of 
treatment,  so  Coke  now  operated  on  an  opposite  prin- 
ciple. He  procured  a  party  in  the  Commons  to  declare 
that  Cowel  was  a  betrayer  of  the  rights  and  liberties  of 
the  people ;  that  he  had  asserted  the  King  was  inde- 
pendent of  Parliament,  and  that  it  was  a  favour  to 
admit  the  consent  of  his  subjects  in  giving  of  subsidies, 
&c. ;  and,  in  a  word,  that  he  drew  his  arguments  from 
the  Roman  Imperial  Code,  and  would  make  the  laws  and 
customs  of  Rome  and  Constantinople  those  of  London 
and  York.      Passages  were  wrested  to    Coke's   design. 


298  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS 

The  prefacer  of  (Towel's  book  very  happily  expr<  -  - 
himself  when  he  says,  "  When  a  suspected  book  is 
brought  to  the  torture,  it  often  confesseth  all,  and  more 

than  it  know-." 

The  Commons  proceeded  criminally  against  Cowel  ; 
and  it  is  said  his  life  was  required,  had  not  the  kin^r  in- 
terposed. The  author  was  imprisoned,  and  the  book 
-u  as  burnt. 

On  this  occasion  was  issued  "a  proclamation  touching 
Dr.  (Towel's  book  called  '  The  Interpreter.'  "  It  may  be 
classed  among  the  most  curious  documents  of  our  lit- 
erary history.  I  do  not  hesitate  to  consider  this  proc- 
lamation as  the  composition  of  James  I. 

I  will  preserve  some  passages  from  this  proclamation, 
not  merely  for  their  majestic  composition,  which  may 
still  be  admired,  and  the  singularity  of  the  ideas,  which 
may  still  be  applied — but  for  the  literary  event  to  which 
it  gave  birth  in  the  appointment  of  a  royal  licenser  for 
the  press.  Proclamations  and  burning  of  books  are  the 
strong  efforts  of  a  weak  government,  exciting  rather 
than  suppressing  public  attention. 

"  This  later  age  and  times  of  the  world  wherein  we 
are  fallen  is  so  much  given  to  verbal  profession,  as  well 
of  religion  as  of  all  commendable  royal  virtues,  but 
wanting  the  actions  and  deeds  agreeable  to  so  sped  a 
a  profession;  as  it  hath  bred  such  an  unsatiable  curi- 
osity in  many  men's  spirit-,  and  such  an  itching  in  the 
tongues  and  pens  of  most  men,  as  nothing  is  left  un- 
I  to  the  bottom  both  in  talking  and  writing. 
For  from  the  very  highest    mysteries    in   the  Godhead 


THE   RESULT   OF   LITERARY   INQUIRIES.  299 

and  the  most  inscrutable  counsels  in  the  Trinity,  to  the 
very  lowest  pit  of  hell  and  the  contused  actions  of  the 
devils  there,  there  is  nothing  now  unsearched  into  by 
the  curiosity  of  men's  brains.  Men,  not  being  contented 
with  the  knowledge  of  so  much  of  the  will  of  God  as  it 
hath  pleased  him  to  reveal,  but  they  will  needs  sit  with 
him  in  his  most  private  closet,  and  become  privy  of 
his  most  inscrutable  counsels.  And,  therefore,  it  is  no 
wonder  that  men  in  these  our  days  do  not  spare  to  wade 
in  all  the  deepest  mysteries  that  belong  to  the  persons 
or  state  of  kings  and  princes,  that  are  gods  upon  earth  ; 
since  we  see  (as  we  have  already  said)  that  they  spare 
not  God  himself.  And  this  licence,  which  every  talker 
or  writer  now  assumeth  to  himself,  is  come  to  this 
abuse;  that  many  Phormios  will  give  counsel  to  Han- 
nibal, and  many  men  that  never  went  of  the  compass  of 
cloysters  or  colleges,  will  freely  wade,  by  their  writings, 
in  the  deepest  mysteries  of  monarchy  and  politick  gov- 
ernment. Whereupon  it  cannot  otherwise  fall  out  but 
that  when  men  go  out  of  their  element  and  meddle  with 
things  above  their  capacity,  themselves  shall  not  only 
go  astray  and  stumble  in  darkness,  but  will  mislead 
also  divers  others  with  themselves  into  many  mistaking* 
and  errors ;  the  proof  whereof  we  have  lately  had  by  a 
book  written  by  Dr.  Cowel,  called  '  The  Interpreter.'  " 

The  royal  reviewer  then  in  a  summary  way  shows 
how  Cowel  had,  "by  meddling  in  matters  beyond  his 
reach,  fallen  into  many  things  to  mistake  and  deceive 
himself."  The  book  is  therefore  "  prohibited ;  the  buy- 
ing, uttering,  or  reading  it ; "  and  those  "  who  have  any 


300  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

copies  are  to  deliver  the  same  presently  upon  tins  publi- 
cation to  the  Mayor  of  London,"  &c,  and  the  proclama- 
tion concludes  with  instituting  licensers  of  the  press  : — 

"Because  that  there  shall  be  better  oversight  of  books 
of  all  sorts  before  they  come  to  the  press,  we  have  re- 
solved to  make  choice  of  commissioners,  that  shall  look 
more  narrowly  into  the  nature  of  all  those  things  that 
shall  be  put  to  the  press,  and  from  whom  a  more  strict 
account  shall  be  yielded  unto  us,  than  hath  been  used 
heretofore." 

What  were  the  feelings  of  our  injured  author,  whose 
integrity  was  so  firm,  and  whose  love  of  study  was  so 
warm,  when  he  reaped  for  his  reward  the  displeasure  of 
his  sovereign,  and  the  indignation  of  his  countrymen — 
accused  at  once  of  contradictory  crimes,  he  could  not  be 
a  betrayer  of  the  rights  of  the  people,  and  at  the  same 
time  limit  the  sovereign  power.  Cowel  retreated  to  his 
college,  and,  like  a  wise  man,  abstained  from  the  press; 
he  pursued  his  private  studies,  while  his  inoffensive  life 
was  a  comment  on  Coke's  inhumanity  more  honourable 
to  Cowel  than  any  of  Coke's  on  Littleton. 

Thus  Cowel  saw,  in  his  own  life,  its  richest  labour 
thrown  aside;  and  when  the  author  and  his  adversary 
were  no  more,  it  became  a  treasure  valued  by  posterity! 
It  was  printed  in  the  reign  of  Charles  I.,  under  the  ad- 
ministration of  Cromwell,  and  again  after  the  Restoration. 
It  received  the  honour  of  a  foreign  edition.  Its  value  is 
still  permanent.  Such  18  the  history  of  a  book  which  oc- 
casioned the  disgrace  of  its  author,  and  embittered  his  life. 

A  similar  calamity  was  the  fate  of  honest  Stowe,  the 


TIIE   RESULT   OP  LITERARY   IXQUIRIKS.  301 

Chronicler.  After  a  long  life  of  labour,  and  having  ex- 
hausted lils  patrimony  in  the  study  of  English  antiqui- 
ties, from  a  reverential  love  to  his  country,  poor  Stowe 
-was  ridiculed,  calumniated,  neglected,  and  persecuted. 
One  cannot  read  without  indignation  and  pity  what 
Howes,  his  continuator,  tells  us  in  his  dedication.  Howes 
had  observed  that — 

"  No  man  would  lend  a  helping  hand  to  the  late  aged 
painful  Chronicler,  nor,  after  his  death,  prosecute  his 
work.  He  applied  himself  to  several  persons  of  dignity 
and  learning,  whose  names  had  got  forth  among  the 
public  as  likely  to  be  the  continuators  of  Stowe  ;  but 
every  one  persisted  in  denying  this,  and  some  imagined 
that  their  secret  enemies  had  mentioned  their  names 
with  a  view  of  injuring  them,  by  incurring  the  dis- 
pleasure of  their  superiors  and  risking  their  own  quiet. 
One  said,  'I  will  not  flatter,  to  scandalise  my  posterity;' 
another,  'I  cannot  see  how  a  man  should  spend  his  la- 
bour and  money  worse  than  in  that  which  acquires  no 
regard  nor  reward  except  backbiting  and  detraction.'' 
One  swore  a  great  oath  and  said,  '  I  thank  God  that  I 
am  not  yet  so  mad  to  waste  my  time,  spend  two  hun- 
dred pounds  a-year,  trouble  myself  and  all  my  friends, 
only  to  give  assurance  of  endless  reproach,  loss  of  liberty, 
and  bring  all  my  days  in  question.' " 

Unhappy  authors !  are  such  then  the  terrors  which 
silence  eloquence,  and  such  the  dangers  which  environ 
truth  ?  Posterity  has  many  discoveries  to  make,  or 
many  deceptions  to  endure!  But  we  are  treading  on 
hot  embers. 


302  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

Such  too  was  the  fate  of  Reginald  Scot,  who,  in  an 
elaborate  and  curious  volume,*  if  he  could  not  stop  the 
torrent  of  the  popular  superstitions  of  witchcraft,  was 
the  first,  at  least,  to  break  and  scatter  the  waves.  It  is 
a  work  which  forms  an  epoch  in  the  history  of  the  human 
mind  in  our  country;  but  the  author  had  anticipated  a 
very  remote  period  of  its  enlargement.  Scot,  the  apostle 
of  humanity,  and  the  legislator  of  reason,  lived  in  retire- 
ment, yet  persecuted  by  religious  credulity  and  legal 
cruelty. 

Selden,  perhaps  the  most  learned  of  our  antiquaries, 
was  often  led,  in  his  curious  investigations,  to  disturb 
his  own  peace,  by  giving  the  result  of  his  inquiries. 
James  I.  and  the  Court  party  were  willing  enough  to 
extol  his  profound  authorities  and  reasonings  on  topics 
which  did  not  interfere  with  their  system  of  arbitrary 
power;  but  they  harassed  and  persecuted  the  author 
whom  they  would  at  other  times  eagerly  quote  as  their 
advocate.  Selden,  in  his  "  History  of  Tithes,"  had 
alarmed  the  clergy  by  the  intricacy  of  his  inquiries.  lie 
pretends,  however,  to  have  only  collected  the  opposite 
opinions  of  others,  without  delivering  his  own.  The 
book  was  not  only  suppressed,  but  the  great  author  was 

*  "The  Discoverie  of  Witchcraft,  necessary  to  be  known  for  the 
undeceiving  of  Judgi  and  Juries,  and  for  th  •  Preservation 

ol  Poor  People."     Third  edition,  1665.     This  was  about  the  time  that, 
according  to  Arnot's  Scots  Trials,  the  expenses  of  burning  a  witch 
inted   to  ninety-'  Is,  fourteen  shillings,  Scots.     The  (in- 

nate old  woman  cost  two  tree.-,  and  employed  two  men  to  watch 
!     One  ought  to  recollect  the  past  follies  of 
human  . .  existing  ones. 


TriE   RESULT   OF   LITRE  ART   INQUIRIES.  303 

further  disgraced  by  subscribing  a  gross  recantation  of 
all  his  learned  investigations — and  was  compelled  to 
receive  in  silence  the  insults  of  courtly  scholars,  who  had 
the  hardihood  to  accuse  him  of  plagiarism,  and  other 
literary  treasons,  which  more  sensibly  hurt  Selden  than 
the  recantation  extorted  from  his  hand  by  "the  Lords 
of  the  High  Commission  Court."  James  I.  would  not 
suffer  him  to  reply  to  them.  "When  the  king  desired 
Selden  to  show  the  right  of  the  British  Crown  to  the 
dominion  of  the  sea,  this  learned  author  having  made 
proper  collections,  Selden,  angried  at  an  imprisonment 
he  had  undergone,  refused  to  publish  the  work.  A  great 
author  like  Selden  degrades  himself  when  any  personal 
feeling,  in  literary  pursuits,  places  him  on  an  equality 
WTith  any  king ;  the  duty  was  to  his  country. — But 
Selden,  alive  to  the  call  of  rival  genius,  when  Grotius 
published,  in  Holland,  his  Mare  libemm,  gave  the  world 
his  Mare  clazisum;  when  Selden  had  to  encounter  Gro- 
tius, and  to  proclaim  to  the  universe  "  the  Sovereignty 
of  the  Seas,"  how  contemptible  to  him  appeared  the 
mean  persecutions  of  a  crowned  head,  and  how  little  his 
own  meaner  resentment ! 

To  this  subject  the  fate  of  Dr.  Hawkesworth  is  some- 
what allied.  It  is  well  known  that  this  author,  having 
distinguished  himself  by  his  pleasing  compositions  in  the 
"Adventurer,"  was  chosen  to  draw  up  the  narrative  of 
Cook's  discoveries  in  the  South  Seas.  The  pictures  of  a 
new  world,  the  description  of  new  manners  in  an  origi- 
nal state  of  society,  and  the  incidents  arising  from  an 
adventure  which  could  find  no  parallel  in  the  annals  of 


30i  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

mankind,  but  under  the  solitary"  genius  of  Columbus — 
all  these  -were  conceived  to  offer  a  history,  to  which  the 
moral  and  contemplative  powers  of  Hawkesworth  only 
were  equal.  Our  author's  fate,  and  that  of  his  work,  are 
known  :  he  incurred  all  the  danger  of  giving  the  result 
of  his  inquiries  ;  he  indulged  his  imagination  till  it  burst 
into  pruriency,  and  discussed  moral  theorems  till  he 
ceased  to  be  moral.  The  shock  it  gave  to  the  feelings 
of  our  author  was  fatal ;  and  the  error  of  a  mind,  intent 
on  inquiries  which,  perhaps,  he  thought  innocent,  and 
which  the  world  condemned  as  criminal,  terminated  in 
death  itself.  Hawkesworth  was  a  vain  man,  and  proud 
of  having  raised  himself  by  his  literary  talents  from  his 
native  obscurity:  of  no  learning,  he  drew  all  his  science 
from  the  Cyclopaedia ;  and,  I  have  heard,  could  not 
always  have  construed  the  Latin  mottos  of  his  own 
paper,  which  were  furnished  by  Johnson  ;  but  his  sensibil- 
ity was  abundant — and  ere  his  work  was  given  to  the 
world,  he  felt  those  tremblings  and  those  doubts  which 
anticipated  his  fate.  That  he  was  in  a  state  of  mental 
agony  respecting  the  reception  of  his  opinions,  and  some 
other  parts  of  his  work,  will,  I  think,  be  discovered  in  the 
following  letter,  hitherto  unpublished.  It  was  addressed, 
with  his  MSS.,  to  a  peer,  to  be  examined  before  they 
were  sent  to  the  press — an  occupation  probably  rather 
too  serious  for  the  noble  critic : — 

"London,  March  2,  1761. 
"  I  think  myself  happy  to  be  permitted  to  put   my 
MSS.  into  your  LordsJiip'  s  hands,  because,  though  it  in- 


A   WORK  WHICn   COULD   FIND   NO   PATRONAGE.   305 

creases  my  anxiety  and  my  fears,  yet  it  will  at  least 
secure  me  from  what  I  should  think  a  far  greater  mis- 
fortune than  any  other  that  can  attend  my  performance, 
the  danger  of  addressing  to  the  King  any  sentiment, 
allusion,  or  opinion,  that  could  make  such  an  address 
improper.  I  have  now  the  honour  to  submit  the  work  to 
your  Lordship,  with  the  dedication ;  from  which  the  duty 
I  owe  to  his  Majesty,  and,  if  I  may  be  permitted  to  add 
anything  to  that,  the  duty  I  owe  to  myself,  have  con- 
curred to  exclude  the  servile,  extravagant,  and  indiscrim 
inate  adulation  which  has  so  often  disgraced  alike  those 
by  whom  it  has  been  given  and  received. 

"  I  remain,  &c.  &c." 

This  elegant  epistle  justly  describes  that  delicacy  in 
style  which  has  been  so  rarely  practised  by  an  indiscrim- 
inate dedicator ;  and  it  not  less  feelingly  touches  on  that 
"  far  greater  misfortune  than  any  other,"  which  finally 
overwhelmed  the  fortitude  and  intellect  of  this  unhappy 
author ! 


A    NATIONAL    WORK    WHICH    COULD    FIND 
NO    PATRONAGE. 

rjlHE  author  who  is  now  before  us  is  De  Lolme ! 

I  shall  consider  as  an  English  author  that  foreigner, 

who  flew  to  our  country  as  the  asylum  of  Europe,  who 

composed  a  noble  work  on  our  Constitution,  and,  having 

imbibed  its  spirit,  acquired  even  the  language  of  a  free 

country. 

20 


306  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

I  do  not  know  an  example  in  our  literary  history  that 
so  loudly  accuses  our  tardy  and  phlegmatic  feeling  re- 
specting authors,  as  the  treatment  De  Lolme  experienced 
in  this  country.  His  book  on  our  Constitution  still 
enters  into  the  studies  of  an  English  patriot,  and  i-  not 
the  worse  for  flattering  and  elevating  the  imagination, 
painting  everything  beautiful,  to  encourage  our  love  aa 
well  as  our  reverence  for  the  most  perfect  system  of  gov- 
ernments. It  was  a  noble  as  well  as  ingenious  efforl 
in  a  foreigner — it  claimed  national  attention — but  could 
not  obtain  even  individual  patronage.  The  fact  is  mor- 
tifying to  record,  that  the  author  who  wanted  every  aid, 
received  less  encouragement  than  if  lie  had  solicited 
subscriptions  for  a  raving  novel,  or  an  idle  poem.  De 
Lolme  was  compelled  to  traffic  with  booksellers  for  this 
work;  and,  as  he  was  a  theoretical  rather  than  a  practi- 
cal politician,  he  was  a  bad  trader,  and  acquired  the 
smallest  remuneration.  He  lived,  in  the  country  to 
which  he  had  rendered  a  national  service,  in  extreme 
obscurity  and  decay  ;  and  the  walls  of  the  Fleet  too  often 
enclosed  the  English  Montesquieu.  He  never  appears  to 
have  received  a  solitary  attention,*  and  became  so  dis- 
1  with  authorship,  that  he  preferred  silently  to  en- 
dure it<  poverty  rather  than  its  other  vexations.  He 
ceased  almost  to  write.  Of  De  Lolme  I  have  heard  little 
r  corded  hut  his  high-mind  ness ;  a  strong  sense  that  he 
stood  degraded  beneath  that   rank  in  society  which  his 

*  Except  by  the  hand  of  literary  charity;  he  was  more  than  once 
relieved  by  the  Literary  Fund.  Such  are  the  authors  only  whom  it  is 
wise  to  patronise. 


A   WORK   WHICH   COULD   FIND  NO   PATRONAGE.    ,307 

book  entitled  him  to  enjoy.  The  cloud  of  poverty  that 
covered  him  only  veiled  without  concealing  its  object  ; 
with  the  manners  and  dress  of  a  decayed  gentleman,  he 
still  showed  the  few  who  met  him  that  he  cherished  a 
spirit  perpetually  at  variance  with  the  adversity  of  his 
circumstances. 

Our  author,  in  a  narrative  prefixed  to  his  work,  is  the 
proud  historian  of  his  own  injured  feelings;  he  smiled  in 
bitterness  on  his  contemporaries,  confident  it  was  a  tale 
reserved  for  posterity. 

After  having  written  the  work  whose  systematic  prin 
ciples  refuted  those  political  notions  which  prevailed  at 
the  era  of  the  American  revolution, — and  whose  truth 
has  been  so  fatally  demonstrated  in  our  own  times,  in 
two  great  revolutions,  which  have  shown  all  the  defects 
and  all  the  mischief  of  nations  rushing  into  a  state  of 
freedom  before  they  are  worthy  of  it, — the  author  can- 
didly acknowledges  he  counted  on  some  sort  of  encour- 
agement, and  little  expected  to  find  the  mere  publication 
had  drawn  him  into  great  inconvenience. 

"  When  my  enlarged  English  edition  was  ready  for  the 
press,  had  I  acquainted  ministers  that  I  was  preparing 
to  boil  my  tea-kettle  with  it,  for  want  of  being  able  to 
afford  the  expenses  of  printing  it ;"  ministers,  it  seems, 
would  not  have  considered  that  he  was  lighting  his  fire 
with  "  myrrh,  and  cassia,  and  precious  ointment." 

In  the  want  of  encouragement  from  great  men,  and 
even  from  booksellers,  De  Lolme  had  recourse  to  a  sub- 
scription ;  and  his  account  of  the  manner  he  was  received 
and  the  indignities  he  endured,  all  which  are  narrated 


303  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTnORS. 

with  great  simplicity,  show  tli.it  whatever  his  knowledge 
of  our  Constitution  might  be,  "  his  knowledge  of  the 
country  was,  at  that  time,  very  incomplete."  At  length, 
when  he  shared  the  profits  of  his  work  with  the  book- 
sellers, they  were  "but  scanty  and  slow."  After  all,  our 
author  sarcastically  congratulates  himself,  that  he — 

"  Was  allowed  to  carry  on  the  above  business  of  sell- 
ing my  book,  without  any  objection  being  formed  against 
me,  fr.>m  my  not  having  served  a  regular  apprenticeship, 
and  without  being  molested  by  the  Inquisition." 

And  further  he  adds — 

"  Several  authors  have  chosen  to  relate,  in  writings 
published  after  death,  the  personal  advantages  by  which 
their  performances  had  been  followed;  as  for  me,  I  have 
thought  otherwise — and  I  will  see  it  primed  while  I  am 
yet  living." 

This,  indeed,  is  the  language  of  irritation!  and  De 
Lolme  degrades  himself  in  the  loudness  of  his  complaint. 
But  if  the  philosopher  lost  his  temper,  that  misfortune 
will  not  take  away  the  dishonour  of  the  occasion  that 
produced  it.  The  country's  shame  is  not  lessened  because 
the  author  who  had  raised  its  glory  throughout  Europe, 
and  instructed  the  nation  in  its  best  lesson,  grew  indig- 
nant at  the  ingratitude  of  his  pupil.  Dc  Lolme  ought 
not  to  have  congratulated  himself  that  he  had  been 
allowed  the  liberty  of  the  press  unharass  1 1  by  an  inqui- 
sition :  this  sarcasm  is  senseless  !  or  his  book  is  a  mere 
fiction  ! 


THE  MISERIES   OF  SUCCESSFUL  AUTHORS.       309 

THE  MISERIES   OF   SUCCESSFUL  AUTHORS. 

*T  TUME  is  an  author  so  celebrated,  a  philosopher  so 
—  serene,  and  a  man  so  extremely  amiable,  if  not  for- 
tunate, that  we  may  be  surprised  to  meet  his  name  in- 
scribed in  a  catalogue  of  literary  calamities.  Look  into 
his  literary  life,  and  you  will  discover  that  the  greater 
portion  was  mortified  and  angried ;  and  that  the  stoic 
60  lost  his  temper,  that  had  not  circumstances  intervened 
which  did  not  depend  on  himself,  Hume  had  abandoned 
his  country  and  changed  his  name  ! 

"  The  first  success  of  most  of  my  writings  was  not  such 
as  to  be  an  object  of  vanity."  His  "  Treatise  of  Human 
Nature "  fell  dead-born  from  the  press.  It  was  cast 
anew  with  another  title,  and  was  at  first  little  more  suc- 
cessful. The  following  letter  to  Des  Maiseaux,  which  I 
believe  is  now  first  published,  gives  us  the  feelings  of 
the  youthful  and  modest  philosopher: — 

"David  Hume  to  Des  Maiseaux. 
"  Sir, — Whenever  you  see  my  name,  you'll  readily 
imagine  the  subject  of  my  letter.  A  young  author  can 
scarce  forbear  speaking  of  his  performance  to  all  the 
world  ;  but  when  he  meets  with  one  that  is  a  good  judge, 
and  whose  instruction  and  advice  he  depends  on,  there 
oucrht  some  indulgence  to  be  sfiven  him.  You  were  so 
good  as  to  promise  me,  that  if  you  could  find  leisure 
from  your  other  occupations,  you  would  look  over  my 
system  of  philosophy,  and  at  the  same  time  ask  the 
opinion  of  such  of  your  acquaintance  as  you  thought 


310  -MITIES    OF 

proper  judges.  Have  you  found  it  sufficiently  intelligi- 
ble ?  Does  it  appear  true  to  you?  Do  the  style  and 
language  seem  tolerable?  These  three  questions  com- 
prehend everything ;  and  I  beg  of  you  to  answer  them 
with  the  utmost  freedom  and  sincerity.  I  know  '  tis  a 
custom  to  flatter  poets  on  their  performances,  but  I  hope 
philosophers  may  be  exempted ;  and  the  more  so  that 
their  cases  are  by  no  means  alike.  When  we  do  not 
approve  of  anything  in  a  poet  we  commonly  can  give  no 
reason  for  our  dislikes  but  our  particular  taste  ;  which 
not  being  convincing,  we  think  it  better  to  conceal  our 
sentiments  altogether.  But  every  error  in  philosophy 
can  be  distinctly  markt  and  proved  to  be  such ;  and  this 
is  a  favour  I  flatter  myself  you'll  indulge  me  in  with  re- 
gard to  the  performance  I  put  into  your  hands.  I  am, 
indeed,  afraid  that  it  would  be  too  great  a  trouble  for 
you  to  mark  all  the  errors  you  have  observed;  I  shall 
only  insist  upon  being  informed  of  the  most  material  of 
them,  and  you  may  assure  yourself  will  consider  it  as  a 
singular  favour.     I  am,  with  great  esteem 

•  Sir,  your  most  obedient  and  most  humble  servant, 
"AprOe  6,  1739.  "  David  HcME. 

"  Please  direct  to  me  at  Ninewells,  near  Berwick-upon- 
Tweed." 

Hume's  own  favourite  "  Inquiry  Concerning  the  Prin- 
ciples of  Morals"  came  unnoticed  and  unobserved  in  the 
world.  When  he  published  the  first  portion  of  his 
"History,"  which  made  even  Hume  himself  sanguine  in 
his  expectations,  he  tells  his  own  tale : — 


THE   MISERIES  OF   SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        31 1 

"  I  thought  that  I  was  the  only  historian  that  had  at 
once  neglected  present  power,  interest,  and  authority, 
and  the  cry  of  popular  prejudices;  and,  as  the  subject 
was  suited  to  every  capacity,  I  expected  proportional 
applause.  But  miserable  was  my  disappointment !  All 
classes  of  men  and  readers  united  in  their  rage  against 
him  who  had  presumed  to  shed  a  generous  tear  for  the 
fate  of  Charles  L  and  the  Earl  of  Strafford."  "  What 
was  still  more  mortifying,  the  book  seemed  to  sink  into 
oblivion,  and  in  a  twelvemonth  not  more  than  forty-five 
copies  were  sold." 

Even  Hume,  a  stoic  hitherto  in  his  literary  character, 
was  struck  down,  and  dismayed — he  lost  all  courage 
to  proceed — and,  had  the  war  not  prevented  him,  "  he 
had  resolved  to  change  his  name,  and  never  more  to 
have  returned  to  his  native  country." 

But  an  author,  though  born  to  suffer  martyrdom, 
does  not  always  expire;  he  may  be  flayed  like  St. 
Bartholomew,  and  yet  he  can  breathe  without  a  skin  ; 
stoned,  like  St.  Stephen,  and  yet  write  on  with  a  broken 
head ;  and  he  has  been  even  known  to  survive  the 
flames,  notwithstanding  the  most  precious  part  of  an 
author,  which  is  obviously  his  book,  has  been  burnt  in 
an  auto  dafe.  Hume  once  more  tried  the  press  in  "  The 
Natural  History  of  Religion."  It  proved  but  another 
martyrdom !  Still  was  the  fall  (as  he  terms  it)  of  the 
first  volume  of  his  History  haunting  his  nervous  im- 
agination, when  he  found  himself  yet  strong  enough 
to  hold  a  pen  in  his  hand,  and  ventured  to  produce  a 
second,    which    "  helped    to    buoy    up    its    unfortunate 


312  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTnORS. 

brother."  But  the  third  part,  containing  the  reign  of 
Elizabeth,  was  particularly  obnoxious,  and  he  was  doubt- 
ful whether  he  was  again  to  be  led  to  the  stake.  But 
Hume,  a  little  hardened  by  a  little  success,  grew,  to 
use  his  own  words,  "  callous  against  the  impressions  of 
public  folly,"  and  completed  his  History,  which  was  now 
received  "with  tolerable,  and  but  tolerable,  success." 

At  length,  in  the  sixty-fifth  year  of  his  age,  our  author 
began,  a  year  or  two  before  he  died,  as  he  writes,  to  see 
"  many  symjitoms  of  my  literary  reputation  breaking 
out  at  last  with  additional  lustre,  though  I  know  that  I 
can  have  but  few  years  to  enjoy  it."  What  a  provok- 
ing consolation  for  a  philosopher,  who,  according  to  the 
result  of  his  own  system,  was  close  upon  a  state  of 
annihilation  ! 

To  Hume,  let  us  add  the  illustrious  name  of  Dry- 
den. 

It  was  after  preparing  a  second  edition  of  Virgil,  that 
the  great  Dryden,  who  had  lived,  and  was  to  die  in 
harness,  found  himself  still  obliged  to  seek  for  daily 
bread.  Scarcely  relieved  from  one  heavy  task,  he  was 
compelled  to  hasten  to  another;  and  his  efforts  were 
now  stimulated  by  a  domestic  feeling,  the  expected 
return  of  his  son  in  ill-health  from  Home.  In  a  letter 
to  hia  bookseller  he  pathetically  writes — "If  it  please 
God  that  I  must  die  of  over study ',  I  cannot  spend  my 
life  better  than  in  preserving  his."  It  was  on  this 
occasion,  on  the  verge  of  his  seventieth  year,  as  he 
describes  himself  in  th<-  dedication  of  his  Virgil,  that, 
"worn  out  with  Btudy,  and  oppressed  with  fortune,"  he 


THE  MISERIES   OF   SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        313 

contracted  to  supply  the  bookseller  with  10,000  verses 
at  sixpence  a  line  ! 

What  was  his  entire  dramatic  life  but  a  series  of 
vexation  and  hostility,  from  his  first  play  to  his  last? 
On  those  very  boards  whence  Dryden  was  to  have 
derived  the  means  of  his  existence  and  his  fame,  he 
saw  his  foibles  aggravated,  and  his  morals  aspersed. 
Overwhelmed  by  the  keen  ridicule  of  Buckingham,  and 
maliciously  mortified  by  the  triumph  which  Settle,  his 
meanest  rival,  was  allowed  to  obtain  over  him,  and 
doomed  still  to  encounter  the  cool  malignant  eye  of 
Langbaine,  who  read  poetry  only  to  detect  plagiarism. 
Contemporary  genius  is  inspected  with  too  much  famil- 
iarity to  be  felt  with  reverence ;  and  the  angry  prefaces 
of  Dryden  only  excited  the  little  revenge  of  the  wits. 
How  could  such  sympathise  with  injured,  but  with  lofty 
feelings  ?  They  spread  two  reports  of  him,  which  may 
not  be  true,  but  which  hurt  him  with  the  public.  It 
was  said  that,  being  jealous  of  the  success  of  Creech, 
for  his  version  of  Lucretius,  he  advised  him  to  attempt 
Horace,  in  which  Dryden  knew  he  would  fail — and  a 
contemporary  haunter  of  the  theatre,  in  a  curious  letter* 
on  The  Winter  Diversions,  says  of  Congreve's  angry 
preface  to  the  Double  Dealer,  that — 

"  The  critics  were  severe  upon  this  play,  which  gave 
the  author  occasion  to  lash  them  in  his  epistle  dedi- 
catory— so  that  'tis  generally  thought  he  has  done  his 
business  and  lost  himself  •  a  thing  he  owes  to  Mr.  Dry- 

*  A  letter  found  among  the  papers  of  the  late  Mr.  Windham,  which 
Mr.  Mulone  has  preserved. 


314  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

den's  treacherous  friendship,  who  being  jealous  of  the 
applause  he  had  got  by  his  Old  Bach  '  <r  deluded  him 
into  a  foolish  imitation  of  his  own  way  of  writing  angry- 
prefaces." 

This  lively  critic  is  still  more  vivacious  on  the  great 
Dry  den,  who  had  then  produced  his  Love  Triumphant^ 
which,  the  critic  says, 

"Was  damned  by  the  universal  cry  of  the  town, 
nemine  contradicente  but  the  conceited  poet.  He  says 
in  his  prologue  that  'this  is  the  last  the  town  must 
expect  from  him;1  he  had  done  himself  a  kindness  had 
he  taken  his  leave  before."  He  then  describes  the 
success  of  Southerne's  Fatal  Marriage,  or  the  Innocent 
Adultery,  and  concludes,  "  This  kind  usage  will  encourage 
desponding  minor  poets,  and  vex  huffing  Dry  den  and 
Congreve  to  madness.'''' 

I  have  quoted  thus  much  of  this  letter,  that  we  may 
have  before  us  a  true  image  of  those  feelings  which 
contemporaries  entertain  of  the  greater  geniuses  of  their 
age;  how  they  seek  to  level  them;  and  in  what  manner 
men  of  genius  are  doomed  to  be  treated — slighted, 
s'arved,  and  abused.  Dryden  and  Congreve!  the  one 
the  finest  genius,  the  other  the  most  exquisite  wit  of  our 
nation,  are  to  be  vexed  to  madness! — their  failures  are 
not  to  excite  sympathy,  but  contempt  or  ridicule!  How 
the  feelings  and  the  language  of  contemporaries  differ 
from  that  of  posterity  !  And  yet  let  us  not  exult  in 
our  purer  and  more  dignified  feelings — we  are,  indeed, 
the  posterity  of  Dryden  and  Congreve;  but  we  are  tho 
contemporaries  of  others  who  must  patiently  hope  for 


THE  MISERIES   OF   SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        315 

better  treatment  from  our  sons  than  they  have  received 
from  the  fathers. 

Dryden  "was  no  master  of  the  pathetic,  yet  never  were 
compositions  more  pathetic  than  the  Prefaces  this  great 
man  has  transmitted  to  posterity !  Opening  all  the 
feelings  of  his  heart,  we  live  among  his  domestic 
sorrows.  Johnson  censures  Dryden  for  saying  he  has 
few  thanks  to  pay  his  stars  that  he  was  born  among 
Englishmen*  We  have  just  seen  that  Hume  went 
farther,  and  sighed  to  fly  to  a  retreat  beyond  that 
country  which  knew  not  to  reward  genius. — What,  if 
Dryden  feft  the  dignity  of  that  character  he  supported, 
dare  we  blame  his  frankness  ?  If  the  age  be  ungen- 
erous, shall  contemporaries  escape  the  scourge  of  the 
great  author,  who  feels  he  is  addressing  another  age 
more  favourable  to  him? 

Johnson,  too,  notices  his  "  Self-commendation ;  his 
diligence  in  reminding  the  world  of  his  merits,  and 
expressing,  with  very  little  scruple,  his  high  opinion  of 
his  own  powers."  Dryden  shall  answer  in  his  own 
words ;  with  all  the  simplicity  of  Montaigne,  he  ex- 
presses himself  with  the  dignity  that  would  have  become 
Milton  or  Gray  : — 

"It  is  a  vanity  common  to  all  writers  to  overvalue 
their  own  productions;  and  it  is  better  for  me  to  own 
this  failing  in  myself,  than  the  world  to  do  it  for  me. 

*  There  is  an  affecting  remonstrance  of  Dryden  to  Hyde,  Earl  of 
Rochester,  on  the  state  of  his  poverty  and  neglect — in  which  is  this 
remarkable  passage : — "  It  is  enough  for  one  age  to  have  neglected  Mr. 
Cowley  and  starved  Mr.  Butler." 


316  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

For  ic/tat  other  reason  have  I  spent  my  life  in  such  an 
unprofitable  study?  Why  am  I  grown  old  in  seeking 
so  barren  a  reward  as  fame?  The  same  parts  and 
application  which  have  made  me  a  poet,  might  have 
raised  me  to  any  honours  of  the  gown,  which  are  often 
given  to  men  of  as  little  learning,  and  less  honesty,  than 
myself." 

How  feelingly  Whitehead  paints  the  situation  of 
Dryden  in  his  old  age  : — 

Yet  lives  the  man.  how  wild  soe'er  his  aim, 
Would  madly  barter  fortune's  smiles  for  fame  ? 
Well  pleas'd  to  shine,  through  each  recording  page, 
The  hapless  Dryden  of  a  shameless  age  1 

Ill-fated  bard !  where'er  thy  name  appears, 
The  weepin?  verse  a  sad  memento  bears  ; 
Ah!  what  avail'd  the  enormous  blaze  between 
Thy  dawn  of  glory  and  thy  closing  scene  ! 
When  sinking  nature  asks  our  kind  repairs, 
■   Unstrung  the  nerves,  and  silver'd  o'er  the  hairs ; 
When  stay'd  reflection  came  uncall'd  at  last, 
And  gray  experience  counts  each  folly  past  1 

Mickle's  version  of  the  Lusiad  offers  an  affecting 
instance  of  the  melancholy  fears  which  often  accompany 
the  progress  of  works  of  magnitude,  undertaken  by  men 
of  genius.  Five  years  he  had  buried  himself  in  a  farm- 
house, devoted  to  the  solitary  labour;  and  he  closes  his 
preface  with  the  fragment  of  a  poem,  whose  stanzas  have 
perpetuated  all  the  tremblings  and  the  emotions,  whose 
unhappy  influence  the  author  had  experienced  through 
the  long  work.  Thus  pathetically  he  addresses  the 
BJ  use : — 


THE   MISERIES   OF   SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        317 

Well  thy  meed  repays  thy  worthless  toil ; 

Upon  thy  houseless  head  pale  want,  descends 
In  bitter  shower;  and  taunting  scorn  still  rends 
And  wakes  thee  trembling  from  thy  golden  dreuin  : 
In  vetchy  bed,  or  loathly  dungeon  ends 
Thy  idled  life 

And  when,  at  length,  the  great  and  anxious  labour 
was  completed,  the  author  was  still  more  unhappy  than 
under  the  former  influence  of  his  foreboding  terrors.  The 
work  is  dedicated  to  the  Duke  of  Buccleugh.  Whether 
his  Grace  had  been  prejudiced  against  the  poetical 
labour  by  Adam  Smith,  who  had  as  little  comprehension 
of  the  nature  of  poetry  as  becomes  a  political  economist, 
or  from  whatever  cause,  after  possessing  it  for  six  weeks 
the  Duke  had  never  condescended  to  open  the  volume. 
It  is  to  the  honour  of  Mickle  that  the  Dedication  is  a 
simple  respectful  inscription,  in  which  the  poet  had  not 
compromised  his  dignity, — and  that  in  the  second  edition 
he  had  the  magnanimity  not  to  withdraw  the  dedication 
to  this  statue-like  patron.  Neither  was  the  critical 
reception  of  thia  splendid  labour  of  five  devoted  years 
grateful  to  the  sensibility  of  the  author :  he  writes  to  a 
friend — 

"  Though  my  work  is  well  received  at  Oxford,  I  will 
honestly  own  to  you,  some  things  have  hurt  me.  A  few 
grammatical  slips  in  the  introduction  have  been  men- 
tioned ;  and  some  things  in  the  notes  about  Virgil, 
Milton,  and  Homer,  have  been  called  the  arrogance  of 
criticism.  But  the  greatest  offence  of  all  is,  what  I  say 
of  blank  verse." 

He  was,  indeed,  after  this  crreat  work  was  given  to  the 


SIS  CALAMITIES   OF  AUTHORS. 

public,  as  unhappy  as  at  any  preceding  period  of  his 
life  ;  and  Mickle,  too,  like  Hume  and  Dryden,  could  feel 
a  wish  to  forsake  his  native  land  !  lie  still  found  his 
"head  houseless;"  and  "the  vetchy  bed"  and  "loathly 
dungeon"  still  haunted  his  dreams.  "To  write  for  the 
booksellers  is  what  I  never  will  do,"  exclaimed  this  man 
of  genius,  though  struck  by  poverty.  He  projected  an 
edition  of  his  own  poems  by  subscription. 

"  Desirous  of  giving  an  edition  of  my  works,  in  which 
I  shall  bestow  the  utmost  attention,  which,  perhaps,  will 
be  my  final  farewell  to  that  blighted  spot  (worse  than  the 
most  bleak  mountains  of  Scotland)  yclept  Parnassus  ; 
after  tins  labour  is  finished,  if  Governor  Johnstone  cannot 
or  does  not  help  me  to  a  little  independence,  I  will  cer- 
tainly bid  adieu  to  Europe,  to  unhappy  suspense,  and 
perhaps  also  to  the  chary  in  of  soul  which  I  feel  to 
accompany  it." 

Such  was  the  language  which  cannot  now  be  read 
without  exciting  our  sympathy  of  the  author  of  the 
version  of  an  epic,  which,  after  a  solemn  devotion  of  no 
small  portion  of  the  most  valuable  years  of  life,  had  been 
presented  to  the  world,  with  not  sufficient  remuneration 
or  notice  of  the  author  to  create  even  hope  in  the  sanguine 
temperament  of  a  poet.  Mickle  was  more  honoured  at 
Lisbon  than  in  his  own  country.  So  imperceptible  are 
tlic  gradations  of  public  favour  to  the  feelings  of  genius, 
and  so  vasl  mm  interval  separates  that  author  who  does 
uol  immediately  address  the  tastes  or  the  fashions  of  his 
age,  from  the  reward  or  the  enjoyment  of  his  studies. 

We  cannot   account,  among  the    lesser    calamities   of 


THE   MISERIES  OF   SUCCESSFUL    AUTHORS        319 

literature,  that  of  a  man  of  genius,  who,  dedicating  his 
days  to  the  composition  of  a  voluminous  and  national 
work,  when  that  labour  is  accomplished,  finds,  on  its 
publication,  the  hope  of  fame,  and  perhaps  other  hopes 
as  necessary  to  reward  past  toil,  and  open  to  future 
enterprise,  all  annihilated.  Yet  this  work  neglected  or 
not  relished,  perhaps  even  the  sport  of  witlings,  after- 
wards is  placed  among  the  treasures  of  our  language, 
when  the  author  is  no  more  !  but  what  is  posthumous 
gratitude,  could  it  reach  even  the  ear  of  an  angel  ? 

The  calamity  is  unavoidable ;  but  this  circumstance 
does  not  lessen  it.  New  works  must  for  a  time  be  sub- 
mitted to  popular  favour;  but  posterity  is  the  inheritance 
of  genius.  The  man  of  genius,  however,  who  has  com- 
posed this  great  work,  calculates  his  vigils,  is  best 
acquainted  with  its  merits,  and  is  not  without  an  antici- 
pation of  the  future  feeling  of  his  country ;  he 

But  weeps  the  more,  because  he  weeps  in  vain. 

Such  is  the  fate  which  has  awaited  many  great  works; 
and  the  heart  of  genius  has  died  away  on  its  own  labours. 
I  need  not  go  so  far  back  as  the  Elizabethan  age  to 
illustrate  a  calamity  which  will  excite  the  sympathy  of 
every  man  of  letters  ;  but  the  great  work  of  a  man  of  no 
ordinary  genius  presents  itself  on  this  occasion. 

This  great  work  is  "  The  Polyolbion"  of  Michael 
Drayton  ;  a  poem  unrivalled  for  its  magnitude  and  its 
character.*     The  genealogy  of  poetry  is  always  suspi- 

*  The  author  explains  the  nature  of  his  book  in  his  title-page  when 
he  calls  it  "  A  Chorographicall  Description  of  tracts,  river?,  mountaines, 


320  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

cious;  yet  I  think  it  owed  its  birth  to  Leland's  magnifi 
cent  view  of  his  intended  work  on  Britain,  and  Avas 
probably  nourished  by  the  "Britannia"  of  Camden,  who 
inherited  the  mighty  industry,  without  the  poetical  spirit, 
of  Leland ;  Drayton  embraced  both.  This  singular  com- 
bination of  topographical  erudition  and  poetical  fancy 
constitutes  a  national  work — a  union  that  some  may 
conceive  not  fortunate,  no  more  than  "the  slow  length" 
of  its  Alexandrine  metre,  for  the  purposes  of  mere 
delight.  Yet  what  theme  can  be  more  elevating  than  a 
bard  chanting  to  his  "Fatherland,"  as  the  Hollanders 
called  their  country  ?  Our  tales  of  ancient  glory,  our 
worthies  who  must  not  die,  our  towns,  our  rivers,  and 
our  mountains,  all  glancing  before  the  picturesque  eye 
of  the  naturalist  and  the  poet!  It  is,  indeed,  a  labour 
of  Hercules ;  but  it  was  not  unaccompanied  by  the  lyre 
of  Apollo. 

This  national  work  was  ill  received  ;  and  the  great 
author  dejected,  never  pardoned  his  contemporaries,  and 
even  lost  his  temper.*     Drayton  and  his  poetical  friends 


forests,  and  other  parts  of  this  renowned  Isle  of  Great  Britaine.  with 
intermixture  of  the  most  remarquable  stories,  antiquities,  wonders, 
raritye',  pleasures,  and  commodities  of  the  same;  digested  in  a  Poem." 
The  maps  with  which  it  is  illustrated  are  curious  for  the  impersona- 
tions of  the  nymphs  of  wood  and  water,  the  sylvan  gods,  and  other 
characters  of  the  poem;  to  which  the  learned  Selden  supplied  notes. 
Ellis  cails  it  '•  a  wonderful  work,  exhibiting  at  once  the  learning  of  an 
historian,  an  antiquary,  a  naturalist,  and  a  geographer,  and  embellish- 
ed by  the  imagination  of  a  poet." — Ed. 

*  In  the  dedication  of  the  first  part  to  Prince  Henry,  the  author 
says  of  his  work.  "  it  cannot  want  envie :  for  even  in  the  birth  it 
alreadie  finds  that." — Eft 


THE   MISERIES   OF  SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        321 

beheld  indignantly  the  trifles  of  the  hour  overpowering 
the  neglected  Polyolbion. 
One  poet  tells  us  that 

they  prefer 

The  fawning  lines  of  every  pamphletor. 

Geo.  "Withers. 

And  a  contemporary  records  the  utter  neglect  of  this 

great  poet: — 

Why  lives  Drayton  when  the  times  refuse 
Both  means  to  live,  and  matter  for  a  muse, 
Only  without  excuse  to  leave  us  quite, 
And  tell  us,  durst  we  act,  he  durst  to  write  ? 

TV.  Browne. 

Drayton  published  his  Polyolbion  first  in  eighteen 
parts  ;  and  the  second  portion  afterwards.  In  this  inter- 
val we  have  a  letter  to  Drummond,  dated  in  1619 : — 

"  I  thank  you,  my  dear  sweet  Drummond,  for  your 
good  opinion  of  Polyolbion.  I  have  done  twelve  books 
more,  that  is,  from  the  18th  book,  which  was  Kent  (if  you 
note  it),  all  the  east  parts  and  north  to  the  river  of 
Tweed ;  but  it  lieth  by  me,  for  the  booksellers  and  I  are 
in  terms ;  they  are  a  company  of  base  knaves,  whom  I 
scorn  and  kick  at." 

The  vengeance  of  the  poet  had  been  more  justly 
wreaked  on  the  buyers  of  books  than  on  the  sellers,  who, 
though  knavery  has  a  strong  connexion  with  trade,  yet, 
were  they  knaves,  they  would  be  true  to  their  own 
interests.  Far  from  impeding  a  successful  author,  book- 
sellers are  apt  to  hurry  his  labours ;  for  they  prefer  the 
crude  to  the  mature  fruit,  whenever  the  public  taste  can 

be  appeased  even  by  an  unripened  dessert. 
21 


322  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

These  "knaves,"  however,  seem,  to  have  succeeded 
in  forcing  poor  Drayton  to  observe  an  abstinence  from 
the  press,  which  must  have  convulsed  all  the  feelings  of 
authorship.  The  second  part  was  not  published  till 
three  years  after  this  letter  was  written;  and  then  with- 
out maps.  Its  preface  is  remarkable  enough  ;  it  is 
pathetic,  till  Drayton  loses  the  dignity  of  genius  in  its 
asperity.     It  is  inscribed,  in  no  good  humour — 

"  To    A>~T   THAT    WILL    READ    IT  ! 

"  When  I  first  undertook  this  poem,  or,  as  some  have 
pleased  to  term  it,  this  Herculean  labour,  I  was  by  some 
virtuous  friends  persuaded  that  I  should  receive  much 
comfort  and  encouragement ;  and  for  these  reasons : 
First,  it  was  a  new  clear  way,  never  before  gone  by  any  ; 
that  it  contained  all  the  delicacies,  delights,  and  rarities 
of  this  renowned  isle,  interwoven  with  the  histories  of  the 
Britons,  Saxons,  Normans,  and  the  later  English.  And 
further,  that  there  is  scarcely  any  of  the  nobility  or 
gentry  of  this  land,  but  that  he  is  some  way  or  other 
interested  therein. 

"But  it  hath  fallen  out  otherwise;  for  instead  of  that 
comfort  which  my  noble  friends  proposed  as  my  due,  I 
have  met  with  barbarous  ignorance  and  base  detraction; 
such  a  cloud  hath  the  devil  drawn  over  the  world's  judg- 
ment. Some  of  the  stationers  that  had  the  selling  of  the 
first  part  of  this  poem,  because  it  went  not  so  fast  away 
in  /A'  selling  as  some  of  their  beastly  and  abominable 
trash  (a  shame  both  to  our  language  and  our  nation), 
have  despightfully  left  out  the  epistles  to  the  readers, 


THE   MISERIES   OF   SUCCESSFUL   AUTHORS.        323 

and  so  have  cousened  the  buyers  with  imperfected  books, 
which  those  that  have  undertaken  the  second  part  have 
been  forced  to  amend  in  the  first,  for  the  small  number 
that  are  yet  remaining  in  their  hands. 

"  And  some  of  our  outlandish,  unnatural  English  (I 
know  not  how  otherwise  to  express  them)  stick  not  to 
say  that  there  is  nothing  in  this  island  worth  studying 
for,  "and  take  a  great  pride  to  be  ignorant  in  anything 
thereof.  As  for  these  cattle,  odi  profanum  vulgus,  et 
arceo ;  of  which  I  account  them,  be  they  never  so 
great." 

Yet,  as  a  true  poet,  whose  impulse,  like  fate,  overturns 
all  opposition,  Drayton  is  not  to  be  thrown  out  of  his 
avocation ;  but  intrepidly  closes  by  promising  "  they 
shall  not  deter  me  from  going  on  with  Scotland,  if  means 
and  time  do  not  hinder  me  to  perform  as  much  as  I  have 
promised  in  my  first  song."  Who  could  have  imagined 
that  such  bitterness  of  style,  and  such  angry  emotions, 
could  have  been  raised  in  the  breast  of  a  poet  of  pastoral 
elegance  and  fancy? 

"Whose  bounding  muse  o'er  ev'ry  mountain  rode, 
And  every  river  warbJed  as  it  flow'd. 

KntKPATRICK. 

It  is  melancholy  to  reflect  that  some  of  the  greatest 
works  in  our  language  have  involved  their  authors  in 
distress  and  anxiety :  and  that  many  have  gone  down 
to  their  grave  insensible  of  that  glory  which  soon 
covered  it. 


304  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  WRITERS   IX   VERSE. 


"TTTTIO  would,  with  the  awful  severity  of  Plato,  ban- 

*  *  ish  poets  from  the  Republic?  But  it  may  be 
desirable  that  the  Republic  should  not  be  banished  from 
poets,  which  it  seems  to  be  when  an  inordinate  pas- 
sion for  writing  verses  drives  them  from  every  active 
pursuit.  There  is  no  greater  enemy  to  domestic  quiet 
than  a  confirmed  versifier;  yet  are  most  of  them  much 
to  be  pitied:  it  is  the  mediocre  critics  they  first  meet 
with  who  are  the  real  origin  of  a  populace  of  mediocre 
poets.  A  young-  writer  of  verses  is  sure  to  get  flattered 
by  those  who  affect  to  admire  what  they  do  not  even 
understand,  and  by  those  who,  because  they  understand, 
imagine  they  are  likewise  endowed  with  delicacy  of  taste 
and  a  critical  judgment.  What  sacrifices  of  social  enjoy- 
ments, and  all  the  business  of  life,  are  lavished  with  a 
prodigal's  ruin  in  an  employment  which  will  be  usually 
discovered  to  be  a  source  of  early  anxiety,  and  of  late 
disappointment  !*     I  say  nothing  of  the  ridicule  in  which 

*  An  elegant  poet  of  our  times  alludes,  with  due  feeling,  to  these 
personal  sacrifices.     Addressing  Poetry,  he  exclaims — ■ 

"  In  devotion  to  thy  heavenly  charms, 

I  clasp'd  tli y  altar  with  my  infant  arms; 

For  thee  neglected  the  wide  field  of  wealth ; 

The  toils  of  interest,  and  the  sports  of  health." 
How  often  may  we  lament  that  poets  are  too  apt  "  to  clasp  the  altar 
with  infant  arms."  Goldsmith  was  near  forty  when  he  published  his 
popular  poems — and  the  greater  number  of  the  most  valued  poems 
were  produced  in  mature  life.  When  the  poet  begins  in  "infancy." 
he  too  often  contracts  a  habit  of  writing  verses,  and  sometimes,  in  all 
his  life,  never  reaches  poetry. 


THE  ILLUSIONS  OF  WRITERS  IN   VERSE.        325 

it  involves  some  wretched  Maevius,  but  of  the  misery 
that  falls  so  heavily  on  him,  and  is  often  entailed  on  his 
generation.  Whitehead  has  versified  an  admirable  re- 
flection of  Pope's,  in  the  preface  to  his  works : — 

For  wanting  wit  bo  totally  undone, 

And  barr'd  all  arts,  for  having  fail'd  in  one  ? 

The  great  mind  of  Blackstone  never  showed  him  more 
a  poet  than  when  he  took,  not  without  aifection,  "  a 
farewell  of  the  Muse,"  on  his  being  called  to  the  bar. 
Drummond,  of  Hawthornden,  quitted  the  bar  from  his 
love  of  poetry ;  yet  he  seems  to  have  lamented  slighting 
the  profession  which  his  father  wished  him  to  pursue. 
He  perceives  his  error,  he  feels  even  contrition,  but  still 
cherishes  it :  no  man,  not  in  his  senses,  ever  had  a  more 
lucid  interval : — 

I  changed  countries,  new  delights  to  find; 
But  ah  !  for  pleasure  I  did  find  new  pain  , 

Enchanting  pleasure  so  did  reason  blind, 

That  lathers  love  and  words  I  scorn'd  as  vain. 

I  know  that  all  the  Muses'  heavenly  lays, 

With  toil  of  spirit  which  are  so  dearly  bought, 
As  idle  sounds  of  few  or  none  are  sought, 

That  there  is  nothing  lighter  than  vain  praise; 
Know  what  I  list,  this  all  cannot  me  move, 
But  that,  alasl  I  both  must  write  and  lovel 

Thus,  like  all  poets,  who,  as  Goldsmith  observes,  "  are 
fond  of  enjoying  the  present,  careless  of  the  future,"  he 
talks  like  a  man  of  sense,  and  acts  like  a  fool. 

This  wonderful  susceptibility  of  praise,  to  which  poets 
seem  more  liable  than  any  other  class  of  authors,  is  in- 
deed their  common  food ;  and  they  could  not  keep  life  in 


326  CALAMITIES  OF   AUTHORS. 

them  without  this  nourishment.  Nat.  Lee,  a  true  poet 
in  all  the  excesses  of  poetical  feelings — for  he  waa  in 
such  raptures  at  times  as  to  lose  his  senses — expresses 
himself  in  very  energetic  language  on  the  effects  of  tha 
praise  necessary  for  poets  : — 

"  Praise,"  says  Lee,  "  is  the  greatest  encouragement  we 
chamelions  can  pretend  to,  or  rather  the  manna  that 
keeps  soul  and  body  together ;  we  devour  it  as  if  it  were 
angels'  food,  and  vainly  think  we  grow  immortal.  There 
is  nothing  transports  a  poet,  next  to  love,  like  commend 
ing  in  the  right  place." 

This,  no  doubt,  is  a  rare  enjoyment,  and  serves  to 
strengthen  his  illusions.  But  the  same  fervid  genius 
elsewhere  confesses,  when  reproached  for  his  ungoverned 
fancy,  that  it  brings  with  itself  its  own  punishment : — 

"  I  cannot  be,"  says  this  great  and  unfortunate  poet, 
"  so  ridiculous  a  creature  to  any  man  as  I  am  to  myself; 
for  who  should  know  the  house  so  well  as  the  good  man 
at  home?  who,  when  his  neighbour  comes  to  see  him, 
still  sets  the  best  rooms  to  view ;  and,  if  he  be  not  a 
wilful  ass,  keeps  the  rubbish  and  lumber  in  some  dark 
hole,  where  nobody  comes  but  himself,  to  mortify  at 
melancholy  hours." 

Study  the  admirable  preface  of  Pope,  composed  at 
that  matured  period  of  life  when  the  fever  of  fame  had 
passed  away,  and  experience  had  corrected  fancy.  It  is 
a  calm  statement  between  authors  and  readers;  there  is 
no  imagination  that  colours  by  a  single  metaphor,  or 
conceals  the  real  feeling  which  moved  the  author  on  that 
solemn  occasion,  of  collecting  his  works  for  the  last  time. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   WRITERS   IN   VERSE.         397 

It  is  on  a  full  review  of  the  past  that  this  great  poet 
delivers  this  remarkable  sentence: — 

"i  believe,  if  any  one,  early  in  his  life,  should  con- 
template the  dangerous  fate  of  authors,  he  would  scarce 
be  of  their  number  on  any  consideration.  The  life  of  a 
wit  is  a  warfare  upon  earth ;  and  to  pretend  to  serve  the 
learned  world  in  any  way,  one  must  have  the  constancy 
of  a  martyr,  and  a  resolution  to  suffer  for  its  sake." 

All  this  is  so  true  in  literary  history,  that  he  who 
affects  to  suspect  the  sincerity  of  Pope's  declaration, 
may  flatter  his  sagacity,  but  will  do  no  credit  to  his 
knowledge. 

If  thus  great  poets  pour  their  lamentations  for  having 
devoted  themselves  to  their  art,  some  sympathy  is  due 
to  the  querulousness  of  a  numerous  race  of  provincial 
bards,  whose  situation  is  ever  at  variance  with  their 
feelings.  These  usually  form  exaggerated  conceptions 
of  their  own  genius,  from  the  habit  of  comparing  them- 
selves with  their  contracted  circle.  Restless,  with  a 
desire  of  poetical  celebrity,  their  heated  imagination 
views  in  the  metropolis  that  fame  and  fortune  denied 
them  in  their  native  town ;  there  they  become  half-her- 
mits and  half-philosophers,  darting  epigrams  which  pro- 
voke hatred,  or  pouring  elegies,  descriptive  of  their 
feelings,  which  move  derision ;  their  neighbours  find  it 
much  easier  to  ascertain  their  foibles  than  comprehend 
their  genius ;  and  both  parties  live  in  a  state  of  mutual 
persecution.  Such,  among  many,  was  the  fate  of  the 
poet  Herrick ;  his  vein  was  pastoral,  and  he  lived  in  the 
elysium  of  the  west,  which,  however,  he  describes  by  the 


32S  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

sullen  epithet,  "Dull  Devonshire,"  where  "he  is  still 
sad."  Strange  that  such  a  poet  should  have  resided  near 
twenty  years  in  one  of  our  most  beautiful  counties  in  a 
very  discontented  humour.  When  he  quitted  his  village 
of  "  Deanbourne,"  the  petulant  poet  left  behind  him  a 
severe  "  farewell,"  which  was  found  still  preserved  in 
the  parish,  after  a  lapse  of  more  than  a  century.  Local 
satire  has  been  often  preserved  by  the  very  objects  it  is 
directed  against,  sometimes  from  the  charm  of  the  wit 
itself,  and  sometimes  from  the  covert  malice  of  attacking 
our  neighbours.  Thus  he  addresses  "Deanbourne,  a  rude 
river  in  Devonshire,  by  which,  sometime,  he  lived : " — 

Dean-bourn,  farewell! 

Thy  rockie  bottom  that  doth  tear  thy  streams, 

And  makes  them  frantic,  e'en  to  all  extremes. 

Rockie  thou  art,  and  rockie  we  discover 

Thy  men, — 

0  men  !  0  manners ! 

0  people  currish,  churlish  as  their  seas — " 

He  rejoices  he  leaves  them,  never  to  return  till  "rocks 
shall  turn  to  rivers."     "When  he  arrives  in  London, 

From  the  dull  confines  of  the  drooping  west, 
To  see  the  day-spring  from  the  pregnant  east, 

he,  "  ravished   in  spirit,"    exclaims,  on   a   view  of  the 

metropolis — 

0  place  !  0  people!  manners  form'd  to  pleaso 
All  nations,  customs,  kindreds,  languages  1 

But  he  fervently  entreats  not  to  be  banished  again  :— 

For,  rather  than  I'll  to  the  west  return, 
I'll  beg  of  tl'oe  first,  here  to  have  miue  urn. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF    WRITERS  IN   VERSE.         329 

The  Devonians  were  avenged ;  for  the  satirist  of  the 
English  Arcadia  was  condemned  again  to  reside  by  "  its 
rockie  side,"  among  "  its  rockie  men." 

Such  has  been  the  usual  chant  of  provincial  poets ; 
and,  if  the  "silky-soft  Favonian  gales"  of  Devon,  with 
its  "  Worthies,"  could  not  escape  the  anger  of  such  a 
poet  as  Herrick,  what  county  may  hope  to  be  saved 
from  the  invective  of  querulous  and  dissatisfied  poets? 

In  this  calamity  of  authors  I  will  show  that  a  great 
poet  felicitated  himself  that  poetry  was  not  the  business 
of  his  life ;  and  afterwards  I  will  bring  forward  an  evi- 
dence that  the  immoderate  pursuit  of  poetry,  with  a  very 
moderate  genius,  creates  a  perpetual  state  of  illusion ; 
and  pursues  grey-headed  folly  even  to  the  verge  of  the 
grave. 

Pope  imagined  that  Prior  was  only  fit  to  make  verses, 
and  less  qualified  for  business  than  Addison  himself. 
Had  Prior  lived  to  finish  that  history  of  his  own  times 
he  was  writing,  we  should  have  seen  how  far  the  opinion 
of  Pope  was  right.  Prior  abandoned  the  Whigs,  who 
had  been  his  first  patrons,  for  the  Tories,  who  were  now 
willing  to  adopt  the  political  apostate.  This  versatility 
for  place  and  pension  rather  shows  that  Prior  was  a  little 
more  "  qualified  for  business  than  Addison." 

Johnson  tells  us  "  Prior  lived  at  a  time  when  the  rage 
of  party  detected  all  which  was  any  man's  interest  to 
hide ;  and,  as  little  ill  is  heard  of  Prior,  it  is  certain  that 
not  much  was  known:"  more,  however,  than  Johnson 
supposes.  This  great  man  came  to  the  pleasing  task  of 
his  poetical  biography  totally  unprepared,  except  with 


330  CALAMITIES   OF   AUTHORS. 

the  maturity  of  his  genius,  as  a  profound  observer  of 
men,  and  an  invincible  dogmatist  in  taste.  In  the  his- 
tory of  the  times,  Johnson  is  deficient,  which  has  de- 
prived us  of  that  permanent  instruction  and  delight  his 
intellectual  powers  had  poured  around  it.  The  charac- 
ter and  the  secret  history  of  Prior  are  laid  open  in  the 
"State  Poems;"*  a  bitter  Whiggish  narrative,  too  par- 
ticular to  be  entirely  fictitious,  while  it  throws  a  new 
light  on  Johnson's  observation  of  Prior's  "propensity  to 
sordid  converse,  and  the  low  delights  of  mean  company," 
which  Johnson  had  imperfectly  learned  from  some  at- 
tendant on  Prior. 

A  vintner's  boy,  the  wretch  was  first  preferred 
To  wait  at  Vice's  gates,  and  pimp  for  bread ; 
To  hold  the  candle,  and  sometimes  the  door, 

Let  in  the  drunkard,  and  let  out . 

But,  as  to  villains  it  has  often  chanc'd, 
Was  for  his  wit  and  wickedness  advane'd. 
Let  no  man  think  his  new  behaviour  strange, 
No  metamorphosis  can  nature  change  ; 
Effects  are  ehain'd  to  causes ;  generally, 
The  rascal  born  will  like  a  rascal  die. 

His  Prince's  favours  follow'd  him  in  vain; 
They  chang'd  the  circumstance,  but  not  the  man. 
While  out  of  pocket,  and  his  spirits  low, 
Tle'd  beg,  write  panegyrics,  cringe,  and  bow; 
But  when  good  pensions  had  his  labours  crown'd, 
His  panegyrics  into  satires  turn'd  ; 
0  what  assiduous  paius  does  Prior  take 
To  let  great  Dorset  see  he  could  mistake  1 
Dissembling  nature  false  description  gave, 
Show'd  him  the  poet,  but  conceal'd  the  knave. 

To   us    the   poet    Prior   is    better   known    than    the 
*  YoL  ii.,  p.  355. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  WRITERS   IN   VERSE.         331 

placeman  Prior;  yet  in  his  own  day  the  reverse  often 
occurred.  Prior  was  a  State  Proteus ;  Sunderland,  the 
most  ambiguous  of  politicians,  was  the  Erie  Robert  to 
whom  he  addressed  his  3Iice;  and  Prior  was  now  Sec- 
retary to  the  Embassy  at  Ryswick  and  Paris ;  independ- 
ent even  of  the  English  ambassador — now  a  Lord  of 
Trade,  and,  at  length,  a  Minister  Plenipotentiary  to 
Louis  XIV. 

Our  business  is  with  his  poetical  feelings. 

Prior  declares  he  was  chiefly  "  a  poet  by  accident ;" 
and  hints,  in  collecting  his  works,  that  "  some  of  them, 
as  they  came  singly  from  the  first  impression,  have  lain 
long  and  quietly  in  Mr.  Tonson's  shop."  When  his 
party  had  their  downfall,  and  he  was  confined  two 
years  in  prison,  he  composed  his  "  Alma,"  to  while  away 
prison  hours ;  and  when,  at  length,  he  obtained  his 
freedom,  he  had  nothing  remaining  but  that  fellowship 
which,  in  his  exaltation,  he  had  been  censured  for  retain- 
ing, but  which  he  then  said  he  might  have  to  live  upon 
at  last.  Prior  had  great  sagacity,  and  too  right  a  notion 
of  human  affairs  in  politics,  to  expect  his  party  would 
last  his  time,  or  in  poetry,  that  he  could  ever  derive  a 
revenue  from  rhymes ! 

I  will  now  show  that  that  rare  personage,  a  sensible 
poet,  in  reviewing  his  life  in  that  hour  of  solitude  when 
no  passion  is  retained  but  truth,  while  we  are  casting  up 
the  amount  of  our  past  days  scrupulously  to  ourselves, 
felicitated  himself  that  the  natural  bent  of  his  mind, 
which  inclined  to  poetry,  had  been  checked,  and  not 
indulged,   throughout  his   whole   life.     Prior   congratu- 


332  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHO?.;. 

Iated  himself  that  he  had  been  only  "  a  poet  by  accident," 
not  by  occupation. 

In  a  manuscript  by  Prior,  consisting  of  i;  An  Essay  on 
Learning.*"  I  find  this  curious  and  inte resting  passage 
entirely  relating  to  the  poet  himself: — 

*•  I  remember  nothing  farther  in  life  than  that  I  made 
verses  ;  I  chose  Guy  Earl  of  Warwick  for  my  first  hero, 
and  killed  Colborne  the  giant  before  I  was  big  enough 
for  Westminster  School.  But  I  had  two  accidents  in 
youth  which  hindered  me  from  bein^r  quite  poss  —  I  with 
the  Muse.  I  was  bred  in  a  college  where  prose  was 
more  in  fashion  than  verse, — and.  as  soon  as  I  had  taken 
my  first  degree.  I  was  sent  the  King's  S  tary  to  the 
Hague;  there  I  had  enough  to  do  in  studying  French 
and  Dutch,  and  altering  my  Terentian  and  Virgilian 
style  into  that  of  Articles  and  Conventions ;  so  that 
try,  '   \ffny  mi    '         '-'•,'      ,me 

■  ■  ty  the 
ly  the  amusement  vf  '  :  and  in  this,  too, 
having  the  prospect  of  some  little  fortune  to  be  made, 
and  friendships  to  be  cultivated  with  the  great  men,  I  did 
not  launch  much  into  satin,  which,  however  agreeable  for 
the  present  to  the  writers  and  encouragers  of  it,  does  in 
time  do  neither  of  them  good ;  considering  the  uncer- 
tainty of  fortune,  and  the  various  changes  of  Ministry, 
that  every  man.  as  he  resents,  may  punish  in  his 
turn  of  greatness  and  pow 

Such  is  the  wholesome  counsel  of  the  Solomon  of  Bards 

ld  aspirant,  who,  in  his  ardour  for  poetical  honours, 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   WRITERS   IN   VERSE.  333 

becomes  careless  of  their  consequences,  if  Jiu  can  but 
possess  them. 

I  have  now  to  bring  forward  one  of  those  unhappy 
men  of  rhyme,  who,  after  many  painful  struggles,  and  a 
long  querulous  life,  have  died  amid  the  ravings  of  their 
immortality — one  of  those  miserable  bards  of  medioc- 
rity whom  no  beadle-critic  could  ever  whip  out  of  the 
poetical  parish. 

There  is  a  case  in  Mr.  Haslam's  "  Observations  on  In- 
sanity," who  assures  us  that  the  jDatient  he  describes  was 
insane,  which  will  appear  strange  to  those  who  have 
watch;  d  more  poets  than  lunatics  ! 

"This  patient,  when  admitted,  Avas  very  noisy,  and  im- 
portunately talkative — reciting  passages  from  the  Greek 
and  Roman  poets,  or  talking  of  his  own  literary  impor- 
tance. He  became  so  troublesome  to  the  other  madmen, 
who  were  sufficiently  occupied  with  their  own  specula- 
tions, that  they  avoided  and  excluded  him  from  the  com- 
mon room ;  so  that  he  was  at  last  reduced  to  the  mortify- 
ing situation  of  being  the  sole  auditor  of  his  own  com- 
positions. He  conceived  himself  very  nearly  related  to 
Anacreon,and  possessed  of  the  peculiar  vein  of  that  poet." 

Such  is  the  very  accurate  case  drawn  up  by  a  medical 
writer.  I  can  conceive  nothing  in  it  to  warrant  the 
charge  of  insanity ;  Mr.  Haslam,  not  being  a  poet,  seems 
to  have  mistaken  the  common  orgasm  of  poetry  for 
insanity  itself. 

Of  such  poets,  one  was  the  late  Percival  Stockdale, 
who,  with  the  most  entertaining  simplicity,  has,  in  "  The 
Memoirs  of  his  Life  and  Writings,"  presented  us  with 


33±  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

a  full-length  figure  of  this  class  of  poets;  those  whom 
the  perpetual  pursuits  of  poetry,  however  indifferent, 
involve  in  a  perpetual  illusion  ;  they  are  only  discovered 
in  their  profound  obscurity  by  the  piteous  cries  they 
sometimes  utter;  they  live  on  querulously,  which  is  an 
evil  for  themselves,  and  to  no  purpose  of  life,  which  is  an 
evil  to  others. 

I  remember  in  my  youth  Percival  Stockdale  as  a  con- 
demned poet  of  the  times,  of  whom  the  bookseller 
Flexney  complained  that,  whenever  this  poet  came  to 
town,  it  cost  him  twenty  pounds.  Flexney  had  been  the 
publisher  of  Churchill's  works  ;  and,  never  forgetting 
the  time  when  he  published  "  The  Rosciad,"  which  at 
first  did  not  sell,  and  afterwards  became  the  most  popu- 
lar poem,  he  was  speculating  all  his  life  for  another 
Churchill,  and  another  quarto  poem.  Stockdale  usually 
brought  him  what  he  wanted — and  Flexney  found  the 
workman,  but  never  the  work. 

Many  a  year  had  passed  in  silence,  and  Stockdale 
could  hardly  be  considered  alive,  when,  to  the  amaze- 
ment of  some  curious  observers  of  our  literature,  a 
venerable  man,  about  his  eightieth  year,  a  vivacious 
spectre,  with  a  cheerful  voice,  seemed  as  if  throwing 
aside  his  shroud  in  gaiety — to  come  to  assure  us  of  the 
immortality  of  one  of  the  worst  poets  of  the  time. 

To  have  taken  this  portrait  from  the  life  would  have 
1 n  difficult;  but  the  artist  has  painted  himself,  and  man- 
ufactured his  own  colours  ;  else  had  our  ordinary  ones  but 
faintly  copied  this  Chinese  grotesque  picture — the  glare 
and  the  glow  must  be  borrowed  from  his  own  palette. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OP   WRITERS   IN  VERSE.         335 

Our  self-biographer  announces  his  "  Life"  with  pro- 
spective rapture,  at  the  moment  he  is  turning  a  sad 
retrospect  on  his  "  "Writings  ;"  for  this  was  the  chequer- 
ed countenance  of  his  character,  a  smile  while  he  was 
writing,  a  tear  when  he  had  published  !  "  I  know,"  he 
exclaims,  "  that  this  book  will  live  and  escape  the  havoc 
that  has  been  made  of  my  literary  fame"  Again — 
"  Before  I  die,  I  think  my  literary  fame  may  be  fixed  on 
an  adamantine  foundation"  Our  old  acquaintance, 
Bias  of  Santillane,  at  setting  out  on  his  travels,  conceived 
himself  to  be  la  huitieme  merveille  du  monde  ;  but  here 
is  one,  who,  after  the  experience  of  a  long  life,  is  writing 
a  large  work  to  prove  himself  that  very  curious  thing. 

What  were  these  mighty  and  unknown  works  ?  Stock- 
dale  confesses  that  all  his  verses  have  been  received  with 
negligence  or  contempt ;  yet  their  mediocrity,  the  abso- 
lute poverty  of  his  genius,  never  once  occurred  to  the 
poetical  patriarch. 

I  have  said  that  the  frequent  origin  of  bad  poets  is 
owing  to  bad  critics ;  and  it  was  the  early  friends  of 
Stockclale,  who,  mistaking  his  animal  spirits  for  genius, 
by  directing  them  into  the  walks  of  poetry,  bewildered 
him  for  ever.  It  was  their  hand  that  heedlessly  fixed 
the  bias  in  the  rolling  bowl  of  his  restless  mind. 

He  tells  us  that  while  yet  a  boy  of  twelve  years  old, 
one  day  talking  with  his  father  at  Branxton,  where  the 
battle  of  Flodclen  was  fought,  the  old  gentleman  said  to 
him  with  great  emphasis — 

"You  may  make  that  place  remarkable  for  your  birth, 
if  you  take  care  of  yourself.     My  father's  understanding 


336  CALAMITIES    OF   AUTHORS. 

was  clear  and  strong,  and  he  could  penetrate  human  na- 
ture. He  already  saw  that  I  had  natural  advantages 
above  those  of  common  men" 

But  it  seems  that,  at  some  earlier  period  even  than  his 
twelfth  year,  some  good-natured  Pythian  had  predicted 
that  Stockdale  would  be  "  a  poet. "  This  ambiguous 
oracle  was  still  listened  to,  after  a  lapse  of  more  than 
half  a  century,  and  the  decree  is  still  repeated  with  fond 
credulity: — "Notwithstanding,"  he  exclaims,  "all  that  is 
])ast,  O  thou  god  of  my  mind  !  (meaning  the  aforesaid 
Pythian)  I  still  hope  that  my  future  fame  will  decidedly 
warrant  the  prediction!'''1 

Stockdale  had,  in  truth,  an  excessive  sensibility  of 
temper,  without  any  control  over  it — he  had  all  the  ner- 
vous contortions  of  the  Sybil,  without  her  inspiration ; 
and  shifting,  in  his  many-shaped  life,  through  all  charac- 
ters and  all  pursuits,  "exalting  the  olive  of  Minerva  with 
the  grape  of  Bacchus,"  as  he  phrases  it,  he  was  a  lover, 
a  tutor,  a  recruiting  officer,  a  reviewer,  and,  at  length,  a 
clergyman;  but  a  poet  eternally!  His  mind  was  so 
curved,  that  nothing  could  stand  steadily  upon  it.  The 
accidents  of  such  a  life  he  describes  with  such  a  face  of 
rueful  simplicity,  and  mixes  up  so  much  grave  drollery  and 
merry  pathos  with  all  he  says  or  does,  and  his  ubiquity 
is  so  wonderful,  that  he  gives  an  idea  of  a  character,  of 
whose  existence  we  had  previously  no  conception,  that 
of  a  sentimental  harlequin.* 

*  My  old  favourite  cynic,  with  all  his  rough  honesty  and  acute 
discrimination,  Anthony  Wood,  engraved  a  sketch  of  Stockdale  when 
he  etched  with  hia  aqua-fortis  the  personage  of  a  brother: — "  Thid 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  WRITERS   IN  VERSE.  337 

In  the  early  part  of  his  life,  Stockdale  undertook  many 
poetical  pilgrimages ;  he  visited  the  house  where 
Thomson  was  horn ;  the  coffee-room  where  Dryden 
presided  among  the  wits,  &c.  Recollecting  the  influence 
of  these  local  associations,  he  breaks  forth,  "  Neither 
the  unrelenting  coldness,  nor  the  repeated  insolence  of 
mankind,  can  prevent  me  from  thinking  that  something 
like   this   enthusiastic  devotion   may  hereafter   be  paid 

to    ME." 

Perhaps  till  this  appeared  it  might  not  be  suspected 
that  any  unlucky  writer  of  verse  could  ever  feel  such  a 
magical  conviction  of  his  poetical  stability.  Stockdale, 
to  assist  this  pilgrimage  to  his  various  shrines,  has  par- 
ticularised all  the  spots  where  his  works  were  composed ! 
Posterity  has  many  shrines  to  visit,  and  will  be  glad  to 
know  (for  perhaps  it  may  excite  a  smile)  that  " '  The 
Philosopher,'  a  poem,  was  written  in  Warwick  Court, 
Holborn,  in  1769,"— "'The  Life  of  Waller,'  in  Round 
Court,  in  the  Strand." — A  good  deal  he  wrote  in  "  May's 
Buildings,  St.  Martin's  Lane,"  &c,  but 

"  In  my  lodgings  at  Portsmouth,  in  St.  Mary's  Street, 
I  wrote  my  'Elegy  on  the  Death  of  a  Lady's  Linnet.'  It 
will  not  be  uninteresting  to  sensibility,  to  thinking  and 
elegant  minds.  It  deeply  interested  me,  and  therefore 
produced  not  one  of  my  weakest  and  worst  written  poems. 
It  was  directly  opposite  to  a  noted  house,  which  was 

Edward  Waterhouse  wrote  a  rhapsodical,  indigested,  whimsical  work, 
and  not  in  the  least  to  be  taken  into  the  hand  of  any  sober  scholar, 
unless  it  be  to  make  him  laugh  or  wonder  at  the  simplicity  of  some 
people.     He  was  a  cock-brained  man,  and  aftorwards  took  orders." 
22 


338  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

distinguished  by  the  name  of  the  green  rails  ;  -where  the 
riotous  orgies  of  Naxos  and  Cythera  contrasted  with  my 
quiet  and  purer  occupations." 

I  would  not,  however,  take  his  own  estimate  of  his 
own  poems ;  because,  after  praising  them  outrageously, 
he  seems  at  times  to  doubt  if  they  are  as  exquisite  as  he 
thinks  them !  He  has  composed  no  one  in  which  some 
poetical  excellence  does  not  appear — and  yet  in  each  nice 
decision  he  holds  with  difficulty  the  trepidations  of  the 
scales  of  criticism — for  he  tells  us  of  "An  Address  to 
the  Supreme  Being,"  that  "it  is  distinguished  through- 
out with  a  natural  and  fervid  piety ;  it  is  flowing  and 
poetical ;  it  is  not  without  its  pathos."  And  yet,  not- 
withstanding all  this  condiment,  the  confection  is 
evidently  good  for  nothing ;  for  he  discovers  that 
"this  flowing,  fervid,  and  poetical  address"  is  "not 
animated  with  that  vigour  which  gives  dignity  and  im- 
pression to  poetry."  One  feels  for  such  unhappy  and 
infected  authors — they  would  think  of  themselves  as 
they  wish  at  the  moment  that  truth  and  experience 
come  in  upon  them  and  rack  them  with  the  most  pain- 
ful feelings. 

Stockdale  once  wrote  a  declamatory  life  of  Waller. 
"When  Johnson's  appeared,  though  in  his  biography,  says 
Stockdale,  "  he  paid  a  large  tribute  to  the  abilities  of 
Goldsmith  and  Ilawkesworth,  yet  he  made  no  mention  of 
my  name.'1''  It  is  evident  that  Johnson,  who  knew  him 
well,  did  not  care  to  remember  it.  When  Johnson  was 
busied  on  the  Life  of  Pope,  Stockdale  wrote  a  pathetic 
letter  to  him  earnestly  imploring    "a  generous  tribute 


THE  ILLUSIONS  OF  WRITERS  IN  VERSE.         339 

from  his  authority."  Johnson  was  still  obdurately 
silent ;  and  Stockdale,  who  had  received  many  acts  of 
humane  kindness  from  him,  adds  with  fretful  naivete, 

"In  his  sentiments  towards  me  he  was  divided  be- 
tween a  benevolence  to  my  interests,  and  a  coldness  to 
my  fame.'''' 

Thus,  in  a  moment,  in  the  perverted  heart  of  the 
scribbler,  will  ever  be  cancelled  all  human  obligation  for 
acts  of  benevolence,  if  we  are  cold  to  his  fame  ! 

And  yet  let  us  not  too  hastily  condemn  these  unhappy 
men,  even  for  the  violation  of  the  lesser  moral  feelings — 
it  is  often  but  a  fatal  effect  from  a  melancholy  cause ;  that 
hallucination  of  the  intellect,  in  which,  if  their  genius,  as 
they  call  it,  sometimes  appears  to  sparkle  like  a  painted 
bubble  in  the  buoyancy  of  their  vanity,  they  are  also 
condemned  to  see  it  sinking  in  the  dark  horrors  of  a 
disappointed  author,  who  has  risked  his  life  and  his  hap- 
piness on  the  miserable  productions  of  his  pen.  The 
agonies  of  a  disappointed  author  cannot,  indeed,  be 
contemplated  without  pain.  If  they  can  instruct,  the 
following  quotation  will  have  its  use. 

Among  the  innumerable  productions  of  Stockdale,  was 
a  "  History  of  Gibraltar,"  which  might  have  been 
interesting,  from  his  having  resided  there :  in  a  moment 
of  despair,  like  Medea,  he  immolated  his  unfortunate 
offspring. 

"  When  I  had  arrived  at  within  a  day's  work  of  its 
conclusion,  in  consequence  of  some  immediate  and  mor- 
tifying accidents,  my  literary  adversity,  and  all  my  other 
misfortunes,  took  fast  hold  of  my  mind  ;  oppressed  it 


340  CALAMITIES   OF    AUTHORS. 

extremely  y  and  reduced  it  to  a  stage  of  the  deepest  de- 
jection and  despondency.  In  this  unhappy  view  of  life, 
I  made  a  sudden  resolution — never  more  to  prosecute  the 
profession  of  an  author  y  to  retire  altogether  from  the 
world,  and  read  only  for  consolation  and  amusement. 
I  committed  to  the  flames  my  History  of  Gibraltar  and 
my  translation  of  Marsollier's  Life  of  Cardinal 
JCimenes  y  for  which  the  bookseller  had  refused  to  pay 
me  the  fifty  guineas,  according  to  agreement." 

This  claims  a  tear  !  Never  were  the  agonies  of  lit- 
erary disappointment  more  pathetically  told. 

But  as  it  is  impossible  to  have  known  poor  deluded 
Stockdale,  and  not  to  have  laughed  at  him  more  than 
to  have  wept  for  him — so  the  catastrophe  of  this  author's 
literary  life  is  as  finely  in  character  as  all  the  acts.  That 
catastrophe,  of  course,  is  his  last  poem. 

After  many  years  his  poetical  demon  having  been 
chained  from  the  world,  suddenly  broke  forth  on  the 
reports  of  a  French  invasion.  The  narrative  shall  pro- 
ceed in  his  own  inimitable  manner. 

"  My  poetical  spirit  excited  me  to  write  my  poem  of 
'The  Invincible  Island.'  I  never  found  myself  in  a 
happier  disposition  to  compose,  nor  ever  wrote  with 
more  pleasure.  I  presumed  warmly  to  hope  that  unless 
inveterate  prejudice  and  malice  were  as  invincible  as 
our  island  itself,  it  would  have  the  diffusive  circulatio?i 
which  I  earnestly  desired. 

"  Flushed  with  this  idea — borne  impetuously  along  by 
ambitioyi  and  by  hope,  though  they  had  often  deluded  mct 
I  set  off  in  the   mail-coach  from  Durham  for  London, 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  WRITERS   IN  VERSE.         341 

on  the  9th  of  December,  1797,  at  midnight,  and  in  a 
severe  storm.  On  my  arrival  in  town  my  poem  was 
advertised,  printed,  and  published  with  great  expedi- 
tion. It  was  printed  for  Clarke  in  New  Bond-street. 
For  several  days  the  sale  was  very  promising ;  and  my 
bookseller  as  well  as  myself  entertained  sanguine  hopes ; 
but  the  demand  for  the  poem  relaxed  gradually  !  From 
this  last  of  many  literaiy  misfortunes,  I  inferred  that 
prejudice  and  malignity,  in  my  fate  as  an  author,  seemed, 
indeed,  to  be  invincible." 

The  catastrophe  of  the  poet  is  much  better  told  than 
anything  in  the  poem,  which  had  not  merit  enough  to 
support  that  interest  which  the  temporary  subject  had 
excited. 

Let  the  fate  of  Stockdale  instruct  some,  and  he  will 
not  have  written  in  vain  the  "  Memoirs  of  his  Life  and 
Writings."  I  have  only  turned  the  literary  feature  to 
our  eye ;  it  was  combined  with  others,  equally  striking, 
from  the  same  mould  in  which  that  was  cast.  Stockdale 
imagined  he  possessed  an  intuitive  knowledge  of  human 
nature.  He  says,  "everything  that  constituted  my 
nature,  my  acquirements,  my  habits,  and  my  fortune, 
conspired  to  let  in  upon  me  a  complete  knowledge  of 
human  nature."  A  most  striking  proof  of  this  know- 
ledge is  his  parallel,  after  the  manner  of  Plutarch, 
between  Charles  XII.  and  himself!  He  frankly  con- 
fesses there  were  some  points  in  which  he  and  the 
Swedish  monarch  did  not  exactly  resemble  each  other. 
He  thinks,  for  instance,  that  the  King  of  Sweden  had  a 
somewhat  more  fervid  and  original  genius  than  himself. 


342  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

and  was  likewise  a  little  more  robust  in  his  person — but, 
subjoins  Stockdale, 

"  Of  our  reciprocal  fortune,  achievements,  and  con- 
duct, some  parts  will  be  to  his  advantage,  and  some  to 
mine.'''' 

Yet  in  regard  to  Fame,  the  main  object  between  him 
and  Charles  XII.,  Stockdale  imagined  that  his  own 

"Will  not  probably  take  its  fixed  and  immoveable 
station,  and  shine  with  its  expanded  and  permanent 
splendour,  till  it  consecrates  his  ashes,  till  it  illumines 
his  tomb !" 

Pope  hesitated  at  deciding  on  the  durability  of  his 
poetry.  Prior  congratulates  himself  that  he  had  not 
devoted  all  his  days  to  rhymes.  Stockdale  imagines  his 
fame  is  to  commence  at  the  very  point  (the  tomb)  where 
genius  trembles  its  own  may  nearly  terminate  ! 

To  close  this  article,  I  could  wish  to  regale  the  poet- 
ical Stockdales  with  a  delectable  morsel  of  fraternal 
biography  ;  such  would  be  the  life,  and  its  memorable 
close,  of  Elkanah  Settle,  who  imagined  himself  to  be  a 
great  poet,  when  he  was  placed  on  a  level  with  Dryden 
by  the  town-wits,  (gentle  spirits!)  to  vex  genius. 

Settle's  play  of  Tlie  Empress  of  Morocco  was  the 
very  first    "adorned  with    sculptures."*      However,  in 

*  It  was  published  in  quarto  in  1673,  and  has  engravings  of  the 
principal  scene  in  each  act,  and  a  front  spiece  representing  the  Duke's 
Theatre  in  Dorset  Gardens,  where  it  was  first  acted  publicly;  it  had 
been  played  twice  at  court  before  this,  by  noble  actors,  "persons  of 
euch  birth  and  honour,"  says  Settle,  "that  ihey  borrowed  no  greatness 
from  the  characters  they  acted."  The  prologues  wore  written  by 
Lords  Mulgrave  and  Rochester,  and  the  utmost  eclat  given  to  the  live 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  WRITERS  IN   VERSE.  343 

due  time,  the  Whigs  despising  his  rhymes,  Settle  tried 
his  prose  for  the  Tories ;  but  he  was  a  magician  whose 
enchantments  never  charmed.  He  at  length  obtained 
the  office  of  the  city  poet,  when  lord  mayors  were  proud 
enough  to  have  laureates  in  their  annual  pageants. 

When  Elkanah  Settle  published  any  party  poem,  lie 
sent  copies  round  to  the  chiefs  of  the  party,  accompanied 
with  addresses,  to  extort  pecuniary  presents.  Pie  bad 
latterly  one  standard  Elegy  and  Epithalamium  printed 
off  with  blanks,  which,  by  the  ingenious  contrivance  of 
filling  up  with  the  names  of  any  considerable  person 
who  died  or  was  married,  no  one  who  was  going  out  of 
life  or  entering  it  could  pass  scot-free  from  the  tax  levied 
by  his  hacknied  muse.  The  following  letter  accompanied 
his  presentation  copy  to  the  Duke  of  Somerset,  of  a 
poem,  in  Latin  and  English,  on  the  Hanover  succession, 
when  Elkanah  wrote  for  the  Whigs,  as  he  had  for  the 
Tories : — 

"  Sir, — Nothing  but  the  greatness  of  the  subject  could 
encourage  my  presumption  in  laying  the  enclosed  Essay 


long  acts  of  rhyming  bombast,  which  was  declared  superior  to  any 
work  of  Dryden's.  As  City  Poet  afterwards,  Settle  composed  the 
pageants,  speeches,  and  songs  for  the  Lord  Mayor's  Shows  from  1691 
to  1708.  Towards  the  close  of  his  career  he  became  impoverished, 
and  wrote  from  necessity  on  all  subjects.  One  of  his  plays,  composed 
for  Mrs.  Mynns'  booth  in  Bartholomew  Fair,  has  been  twice  printed, 
though  both  editions  are  now  uncommonly  rare.  It  is  called  the 
"  Siege  of  Troy ;"  and  its  popularity  is  attested  by  Hogarth's  print  of 
Southwark  Fair,  where  outside  of  Lee  and  Harper's  great  theatrical 
booth  is  exhibited  a  painting  of  the  Trojan  horse,  and  the  announce- 
ment "  The  Siege  of  Troy  is  here." — Ed. 


344  CALAMITIES    OF    AUTHORS. 

at  your  Grace's  feet,  being,  with  all  profound  humility, 
your  Grace's  most  dutiful  servant, 

"E.  Settle." 

In  the  latter  part  of  his  life  Settle  dropped  still  lower, 
and  became  the  poet  of  a  booth  at  Bartholomew  Fair, 
and  composed  drolls,  for  which  the  rival  of  Dryden,  it 
seems,  had  a  genius  ! — but  it  was  little  respected — for 
two  great  personages,  "Mrs.  Mynns  and  her  daughter, 
Mrs.  Leigh,"  approving  of  their  great  poet's  happy 
invention  in  one  of  his  own  drolls,  "  St.  George  for 
England,"  of  a  green  dragon,  as  large  as  life,  insisted, 
as  the  tyrant  of  old  did  to  the  inventor  of  the  brazen 
bull,  that  the  first  experiment  should  be  made  on  the 
artist  himself,  and  Settle  was  tried  in  his  own  dragon; 
he  crept  in  with  all  his  genius,  and  did  "  act  the  dragon, 
enclosed  in  a  case  of  green  leather  of  his  own  inven- 
tion." The  circumstance  is  recorded  in  the  lively  verse 
of  Young,  in  his  "  Epistle  to  Pope  concerning  the  au- 
thors of  the  age." 

Poor  Elkanah,  all  other  changes  past, 

For  bread  in  Smithfield  dragons  hiss'd  at  last, 

Spit  streams  of  fire  to  make  the  butchers  gape, 

And  found  his  manners  suited  to  his  shape; 

Such  is  the  fate  of  talents  misapplied, 

S3  lived  your  prototype,  and  so  he  died. 


INDEX. 


AKEystriE  exhibited  as  a  ludicrous  per- 
sonage by  Smollett ;  bis  real  character 
cast  in  the  mould  of  antiquity,  re.  176. 

Amiiurst,  a  political  author,  his  historv, 
19. 

A kn all,  a  great  political  scribe,  18. 

Asciiam,  Roger,  the  founder  of  English 
prose,  31. 

Athene  Britannic.*,  one  of  the  rarest 
works,  account  of,  n,  49. 

Athene  Oxonienses,  an  apology  for  147 

Authors  by  profession,  a  phrase  of  mod- 
ern origin.  14. 

■ original  letter  to  a  Minister  from 

one,  15. 

Fielding's  apology  for  them,  22. 

Atuhors,  Horace  Walpole  affects  to  de- 
spise them,  67. 

their  maladies,  108. 

case  of,  stated,  26. 

incompetent  remuneration  of,  34. 

who  wrote  above  the  genius  of 

their  own  age,  130. 

ill  reception  from  the  public  of 

their  valuable  works,  131. 

• who  have  sacrificed  their  fortunes 

to  their  studies,  132. 

who  commenced    their    literary 

life  with  ardour,  and  found  their  gen- 
ius obstructed  by  numerous  causes, 
136. 

who  have  never  published  their 

works,  139. 

provincial,  liable  to  bad  passions, 

197. 

Baker,  Rev.  Thomas,  his  collection,  144. 

Barnes,  Joshua,  wrote  a  poem  to  prove 
Solomon  was  the  author  of  the  "  Ili- 
ad," and  why,  149. 

his  pathetic  letter  descriptive  of 

his  literary  calamities,  150. 

hints  at  the  vast  number  of  his 

unpublished  works,  151. 

Bayne,  Alexander,  died  of  intense  ap- 
plication, 111. 

Biographia  Britannic  a  in  danger  of 
being  left  unfinished,  131. 

Booksellers  in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth, 
3S. 

why  their  interest  is  rarely  com- 
bined with  the  advancement  of  litera- 
ture, 134 


Booksellers,  why  they  prefer  the  crude 

to  the  matured  fruit,  821. 
Burton,  his  laborious  work,  129. 
his  constitutional  melancholy,  n., 

278. 

Carey,    Henry,   inventor    of    "Namby 

Pamby,"  156. 
'•  Carey's  Wish,"  a  patriotic  song 

on  the  Freedom  of  Election,  by  the 

author  of  "God  save  the  King,"  n., 

157. 
"  Sally  in  our  Alley,"  a  popular 

ballad,  its  curious  origin,  158. 

author  of  several  of  our  national 


poems,  160. 

his  miserable  end,  160. 

Carte,  Thomas,   his  valuable  history, 

170-172. 
the  first  proposer  of  public  libra- 
ries, 171. 

its  fate  from  his  indiscretion,  173. 

Castell,  Dr.,  ruined  in  health  and  for- 
tune by  the  publication  of  his  Poly- 

glott,  n.,  2SS. 
Ciiatterton,  his  balance-sheet  on  the 

Lord  Mayor's  death,  n.,  41. 
Cm  -in  -ovarii,  Thomas,  an  unhappy  poet, 

describes  his  patrons,  42. 
his   pathetic   description   of    his 

wretched  old  age,  43. 
Cole,  Rev.  William,  his  character,  185.. 

his  melancholy  confession  on  his 

lengthened  literary  labours,  142. 

his  anxiety  how  best  to  dispose 

of  his  collections.  143. 

Collins,  Arthur,  historian  of  the  Peer- 
age. 132. 

Collins,  Wm.,  the  poet,  quits  the  uni- 
versity suddenly  with  romantic  hopes 
of  becoming  an  author.  273. 

publishes     his   '•Odes"   without 

success,   and   afterwards    indignantly 
burns  the  edition,  275. 

defended  from   some  reproaches 

of  irresolution,  made  by  Johnson,  276. 

anecdote  of  his  life  in  the  me- 
tropolis, 27S. 

anecdotes  of,  when  under  the  in- 
fluence ot  a  disordered   intellect,  2S0. 

his  monument  described,  281. 

■ two  sonnets  descriptive  of  Col- 
lins, 2*2. 


846 


INDEX. 


Collins.  Win.,  his  poetical  character  de- 
fended. 234. 

CONTPJUt'ORABIES,    how      they      Seek      tO 

level  et-nius,  ^  14. 

Cotcsave.  Handle,  falls  blind  in  the 
labour  nf  bis  -  Dictionary,"  1 18. 

Cuwel    incurs    by   bis    curious    work 
"The  Interpreter"  ibe  censure  of  tbe 
Kin:.'  and  the  Commons  on  oi  'osr  ;  J 
principles.  295. 

Co\\  lev.  original  letter  from.  «..  57. 

. his  essays  form  a  part  of  his  con- 
fessions. 58. 

describes  bis  reclines  at  court.  59. 

bis  melancholy  attributed  to  bis 

'•(i,i,.    [,.    p.niti.s."'  |>y    wiich   he   in- 
CIIITeri  trie  disgrace  ol  the  court,  04. 

■  bis  remarkab'e  lamentation  for 
having  written  poetry.  65 

bis  Epitaph  composed  bv  him- 
self, OtJ 

Criiic  poetical,  without  any  taste,  how 
he  contrivt  <1  to  criticise  po<  m>.  219. 

Criticisms,  illiberal,  some  of  its  con  se- 
quences suited,  'lid. 

Davies.  Myles,  a  mendicant  autlior,  bis 

Hie.   4-. 

Dedication,  composed  by  a  patron  to 

himself,  n..  48. 
Dedications,  used  in  an  extraordinary 

way,  a..  4S. 
De  Lolme's  work  on   the  Constitution   I 

could  liml  no  patronage,  and  tbe  uu-  i 

tbor's  bitter  complaints,  30f>. 
- relieved   by   tbe  Literary  Fund, 

v..  ■  00. 
Denn'S,   John,  distinguished   as  "Tbe 

Criiic."  61. 

■  bis  "Original  Letters"'  and  "  L*e- 
marks  <in  Prince  Arthur,"  bis  best 
productions,  81. 

i  anecdotes   of   his    brutal  vehe- 

mence, 63. 

■  curious  caricature  of  bis  personal 
manners,  -4. 

a  specimen  of  his  anti-poetical 

notions.  ?(..  so. 
bis  frenzy  on  the  Italian  Opera, 

S9. 

■  acknowledges  tbat  be  is  consid- 
ered as  Ill-natured,  and  complains  of 
public  neglect,  59 

■  more  the  victim  of  his  criticisms 
than  the  genius  be  Insulted,  91. 

Diiaki'.   Dr.  James,    a    political    writer, 

in-  miserable  life,  'J". 
DuaitmnV  national  wort,  "Tbe  Polyol- 

bion,"   Hi   received,  and    tbe  author 

cr,  atlv  dejected,  319. 

■  nngry  preface  addressed  "To  any 
that  "ill  read  it."  822. 

Decmmond  of  Haw  thornden,  bis  love  of 
poctrj 

Dkvki  n,  in  bis  old  nge,  complains  of 
dying  of  o\  er-stndy,  812, 

bis  dramatic  life  a  scries  of  vexa- 
tions, olJ. 


Dryprn  regrets  he  was  born  among  Eng- 
lishmen. 815. 

remai  kablc    confession    of   the 

poet,  315. 

Exercise,  to  be  substituted  for  medicine 
by    literaiy  men,  and  which  is  the 

best   Ik.  1 10. 

r  arnewortii's  Translation  of  Machia- 

vel,  13t). 
Fi  l.i.i  k's   "  Medicina   Gymnastica,"  n., 

110. 

Gibbon.  Ed.,  price  of  bis  copyright  135. 
Goi.l  smith's  remonstrance  on   illiberal 

criticism,  from  which  tbe  law  gives  no 

protection.  218. 
Granger's  con  plaint  of  not  receiving 

ball  the  |'a\  oi  a  scavenger,  181. 
Green  I,  Robert. a  town  wit, bis  poverty 

ami  death,  87. 

awiul  satirical  address  to.  «.,  183. 

Gbey,   Dr.   Zachary,  tbe   father  of  our 

commentators,  ridiculed  and   abused, 

it;o. 
tbe  probable  origin  of  bis  new 

mode  of  illustrating  Hudibnis,  161. 
Guthrie  otters  bis  services  as  a  hack- 

ney -writer  to  a  minister,  15. 

IIaivet.  Gabriel,  bis  character.  ISO. 

bis  dc\  ice  against  bis  antagonist, 

11..  188. 
bis  portrait.  1ST. 

severely  satirised  by  Nash  for  bis 

prolix  periods,  188. 

— cannot  be  endured  to  be  consid- 
ered as  Ibe  son   of  a  rope-maker.  190. 

bis  pretended    sordid    manners, 

191. 

his  affectation  of  Italian  fashions, 

191. 

bis  frbnds  ridiculed,  192. 

bis  [K'dantic  taste  lor  bexameter 

verses.  A  c,  195. 

bis    curious    remonstrance   with 

Nash,  198. 

bis  lamentation    on    invectives, 

1 99. 

bis  books,  and  Nash's,  suppressed 

by  order  of  the  Archbishop  ot  Canter- 
bury tor  their  mutual  virulence.  184. 

Ham  ki>«  oi  in.  Dr..  letter  on  pies,  ntil  g 
bis  MS.  of  Cook's  Voyage*  for  exami- 
nation, the  publication  ol  which  over- 
whelmed bis  lortitude  and  intellect, 
804. 

Henley.  Orator,  this  buffoon  an  inde- 
fatigable student,  an  elegant  poet,  and 
wit,  92. 

bis  poem  of  -Esther,  Queen  of 

Persia.''  98. 

sudden  change  in  his  character, 

90. 

seems  to  have  attempted  to  pull 

down  me  Church  and  the  University, 
98. 


INDEX. 


347 


Hkni.KT,  Orator,  some  idea  of  his  lec- 
tures. »..  99. 

his  j>r<ijocts  to  supply  .1  Univer- 
sal School,  100. 

■ specimens  of  his  buffoonery  on 

so'emii  occasions.  108. 

his  "  Defence  of  the  Oratory," 

«..  10a 

■  once  found  his  match  in  two  dis- 
putants III"). 

sp  ciinen   of   the  diary  of  his 

"Oratory  Transactions,"  lOfi, 

close  of  his  career,  «.,  105. 

his  character.  1 07 

Henry,  Dr.,  the  Historian,  the  snle  of 
liis  work,  on  which  he  had  expended 
most  of  his  tortnne  and  his  life, 
stopped,  ami  himself  ridiculed,  by  a 
conspiracy  raised  against  him,  209. 

■  caustic  review  of  his  history,  n., 
209. 

1If.i;<)N.  Robert  draws  up  the  distresses 
of  a  man  of  letters  living  by  literary 
indtis  ry.  in  the  confinement  of  a 
spotigi tig-house,  from  his  original  let- 
ter. 125. 

HF.r.KtrK.  Robert,  petulant  invective 
against  Devonshire,  828. 

Home  and  liis  tragedy  of  "Douglas," 
121. 

Howeu  nearly  lost  his  life  by  excessive 
study.  114. 

Hume,  liis  literary  life  mortified  with 
disappointments.  309. 

wished  to  change  his  name  and 

his  country.  311. 

his  letter  to  Dcs  Maiseaux  re- 
questing his  opinion  of  his  philoso- 
phy, 309. 

Icon  T.ihellornm.  See  Athence  Bri- 
lanniae. 

Kennt.t's,  Bishop,  Register  and  Chron- 
icle. 135. 

Keniiick.  Dr.,  a  caustic  critic,  treats  our 
great  authors  with  the  most  amusing 
arrogance.  216. 

an  epigram  on  himself,  by  him- 
self, re.,  217. 

Lf.k.  Nat.  his  love  of  praise.  326. 
Lei.ami,  the  antiquary,  an  accomplished 

scholar.  264. 
his  "Strena,"  ir  New  Tear's  Gift 

to  Henry  VIII.;   an   account  of  his 

studies,  and  his  magnificent  projects, 

265. 
•  doubts  that  his  labours  will  reach 

posterity.  207. 
■ he  values  "the  furniture  "  of  his 

mind,  26S. 

■  his  bust  striking  from  its  physi- 
ognomy, 271). 

— - —  the  ruins  of  his  mind  discovered 
in  his  library,  271. 

■  the  inscription  on  his  tomb  prob- 


ably had  been  composed  by  himself, 
belure  his  insanity.  272. 

Lk;iitfoot  e.  uld  n't  procure  the  print- 
in;.'  01  his  work.  293. 

LlTRKAKV  I'bopkktv.  dilliculties  to  as- 
cerinin  its  nature.  '.'7. 

history  of.  '27. 

value  »f.  n..  27. 

Lloyd's,  Bishop,  collections  and  their 
fate.  144. 

Logan,  tie'  history  of  his  literary  disap- 
pointments. 120. 

dies  broken-hearted.  122. 

his  poetic  genius.  128. 

M'Donamx,   or   Matthew  Brambl",  his 

tragical  reply  to  an  inquiry  after  his 

tragedy.  119. 
Macdiaumid,  John,  died  of  over-study 

and  exhaustion.  1 15. 
Mm:  1  in   M  ai:-I'icf.i.atk"s  libels   issuing 

from  a  moveable  press  carried  about 

the  country,  17S. 
Mklaxciioi.y   persons    frequently    the 

most   delightful   companions.  «...  27S. 
Miokle's  pathetic  address  to  his  muse, 

317. 
his    disappointments     after   the 

publication  of  the  "  Lusiad  "  induce 

I11 111    to   wish   to  abandon  his  native 

country,  818. 
Milton's  works  the  favourite    prey  of 

I ksellers.  28. 

Moktimeu,   Thomas,   his    complaint  in 

old    age  of  the    preference   given   to 

>  nnng  adventurers,  1  lt>. 
Moti'Kix.  IVter.  and  his  patron,  4S. 
MuuiiousE,  political  clubs,  ?(.,  52. 

Nash,  Tom,  the.  misery  of  his  literary 
life.  8S. 

threatens  his  patrons,  39. 

silences     Mar-Prelate    with    his 

own  weapons,  17S. 

his  character  as  a  Lucianic  sati- 
rist, 185. 

his  "  Have  with  yon  to  Saffron 

W'alden,"  a  singular  literarv  invective 
against  Gabriel  Harvey.  1S4. 

Nbwton,  ofa  fearful  temper  in  criticism, 
n.  215 

Newton's  "Optics''  first  favourably 
noticed  in  France,  130. 

OoKt.EY,  Simon,  among  the  first  of  our 
authors  who  exhibited  a  great  nation 
in  the  East  in  his  "History  of  the 
Saracens."  285. 

his  suit'  rings  expressed  in  a  re- 
markable preface  dated  from  gaol, 
2S5 

dines  with    the  Karl   of  Oxford  ; 

an  original  letter  of  apology  for  his 
nncourtly  behaviour.  289. 

exults  in  prison  for  the  leisure  it 

affords  for  study.  »..  2SS. 

neglected,  but  employed  by  min- 
isters, 2"U. 


348 


INDEX. 


OLDMtxov    assorts     Lord     Clarendon's 
"History"  to  have  been  inter]* 
while  himself  falsities  Daniel's  "Chron- 
icle," «.,  IS. 

Patttson,  a  yonng  poet,  his  college  ca- 
reer. 152. 

liis    despair    in     an    address    to 

Heaven,  and  a  pathetic  letter.  155. 

Poets,  mediocre  Critics  are  the  real 
origin  of  mediocre,  324. 

■  Nat.  Lee  describes  their  wonder- 
ful susceptibility  of  praise,  326. 

provincial,  their  situation  at  va- 
riance with  their  feelings.  327. 

Pope,  Alex.,  his  opinion  of  ■■  the  Dan- 
gerous Fate  of  Authors,"''  32T. 

the  Poet  Prior.  329. 

Pridbaux'8  •Connection  of  Old  and  New 
Testament."  130. 

Prince's  "  Worthies  of  Devon,"  130. 

Prior,  curious  character  of,  from  a  Whig 
satire.  830. 

felicitated  himself  that  his  natu- 
ral inclination  for  poetry  had  been 
checked,  88L 

Proclamation-  issued  by  James  I. 
against  Cowel's  book,  "The  Interpre- 
ter," a  curious  document  in  literary 
history,  29a 

Prynni:.  a  voluminous  author  without 
judgment,  but  the  character  of  the 
man  not  so  ridiculous  as  the  author, 
225. 

his  intrepid  character,  226. 

■  his  curious  argument  against  be- 
ing debarred  from  pen  and  ink.  «.,  226. 

his  interview  with  Laud  in  the 

Tower,  n.,  229. 
■ had  a  good  deal  of  cunning  in  his 

character.  v.,  230. 
grieved   for    the    Revolution   in 

which  he   himself   had    been   so   con- 
spicuous a  leader,  231. 
his  speeches  as  voluminous  as  his 

writings,  282* 

seldom  dined.  233. 

account  of  bis  famous  "  Histrio- 

mastix."  288. 
Milton    admirably   characterises 

Prynne's  absurd  learning,  ».,  2 

how  the  ••  Histriomastix"  was  at 

once  an  elaborate  work  of  many  years, 
and  yet  a  temporary  satin — the  secret 
history  of  the  bonk  being  as  extraor- 
dinary as  the  book  Itself,  235. 

RlDlCUXE  described.  175. 

it  creates  a  fictitious  personage, 

176. 

RnsoN,  Joseph,  the  '  anti- 

quary, carried  criticism  to  insanity.  80. 

RlTBON,   Isaac,  a    young    Scotch   writer, 

.  attempting  to  exisl  bj  the 
efforts  of  his  pen,  117. 
bis    extemporary    rhapsody  de- 
scriptive of  his  melancholy  fate,  118. 

ItUSBWOBTH      dies    of   a    broken    heart, 


havins  neglected  his  own  affairs  for 
his  "  Historical  Colli  etions,"  183. 

IIvmei'.'s  distress  in  forming  his  u His- 
torical Collections,"  182. 

Ryves,  Eliza,  her  extraordinary  literary 
exertions  and  melancholy  end.  164. 

Sale,  the  learned,  often  wanted  a  meal 
while  translating  the  Koran.  ;/..  '2-9. 

Scot.  Reginald,  persecuted  for  his  work 
against  Witchcraft,  802. 

Scoit.  of  Am  well,  the  Quaker  and  poet, 
offended  at  being  compared  to  Capt, 
Macheath  bv  the  affected  witticism 
of  a  Reviewer,  220. 

his  extraordinary  "Letter  to  the 

Critical  Reviewers,"  in  which  he  enu- 
merates his  own  poetical  beauties, 
220. 

Seldf.x  compelled  to  recant  his  opin- 
ions, and  not  suffered  to  reply  to  his 
calumniators.  302. 

refuses  dames  I.  to  publish  his 

defence  of  the  "Sovereignty  of  the 
Seas  "  till  Grotius  provoked  his  reply, 
808. 

Settle,  Elkanah,  the  ludicrous  close  of  a 
scribbler's  life,  344. 

Shuokford,  "Sacred  and  Profane  His- 
tory Connected,"  180. 

Smollett  confesses  the  incredible  labour 
and  ehasriu  he  had  endured  as  an 
author,  23. 

Steele,  his  paradoxical  character,  257. 

why     he     wrote     a     laughable 

comedy  after  his  "  Christian  Hero," 
25S. 

his  ill  choice  in  a  wife  of  an  nn- 

congenial  character,  260. 

■ specimens  of  his  "Love  De- 
spatches,'" n..  261. 

finely  contrasts  bis  own  character 

with  that  of  Addison,  262. 

Btillujo fleet,  Bishop,  his  end  supposed 
ave  been  hastened  by  Locke's 
confutation  of  bis  metaphysical  no- 
tion-, n.,  215. 

Sio,  Ki.Ai.E.  Perceval,  bis  character  an 
extraordinary  instance  of  the  illusions 
of  writers  in  vers< , 

draws  a  parallel  between  Charles 

XII.  and  himself.  341. 

Stowe.  the  chronicler,  petitions  to  be 
a  licensed  l»  ggar,  4ti. 

Btkott,  the  antiquary,  a  man  of  genius 
and  imagination,  182. 

his  spirited  letters  on  commen- 
cing bis  career  of  authorship.  1M7. 

Stuart,  1  >r.  Gilbert,  his  envious  char- 
acter; desirous  ol  destroying  tin- 
literary  wf.rks  (1f  li is  countrymen.  201. 

projects  the  "  Edinbnrgh  Maga- 
zine and  Review;"  its  design.  202. 

his  horrid  feelings  excited  by  his 

disappointments.  206. 

raises,!  literary  conspiracy  against 

l)r.  Henry,  208. 

dies  miserably,  218. 


IXDEX. 


349 


Subscriptions  once  inundated  our 
literature  with  worthless  works,  47. 

Tolano,  a  lover  of  study,  240. 

defends  himself  from  the  asper- 
sion of  atheism  or  deism.  242. 

■ accused  of  an  intention  to  found 

a  sect,  248. 

— — —  had  the  art  of  explaining  away 
his  own  words.  244. 

"  a  great  artificer  of  title-pages, 

his  "  Pantheisticon,"  247. 

■ projects  a  new  office  of  a  private 

monitor  to  the  minister,  250. 
— — —  of  the   books   he   read    and    his 

Mas.  n.,  254. 
— - — -  his  panegyrical  epitaph  composed 

by  himself.  253. 
— - —  Locke's  admirable  foresight  of  his 

character,  257. 

Walpoie,  Horace,  his  literary  character,  i 
67. 


Walpole,  Horace,  instances  of  his 
pointed  vivacity  againstauthors  n  67 

why    he  attacked    the    fame   or 

Sidney,  and  defended  Richard  III.,  ;i 

— Ins     literary     mortifications      ;ie- 

knowledged  by  himself  from  his 
original  letters.  73. 

— how    Cray    treated     him    when 

invited  to  Strawberry-hill,  n..  73. 

— ; —  extraordinary  letter  or,  express- 
ing Ins  contempt  of  his  must  cele- 
brated contemporaries,  77. 

Wabbubton,  dishonest  criticism  on 
Grey  a  ■■  Hndibras,"  162. 

Whabton,  Henry,  sunk  under  his  his- 
torical studies,  114. 

Wood,  Anthony,  his  character,  144 

— - — an    apology    for   the    "Athenas 

Oxonienses,"  147. 
Wood,  Anthony,  the  writers  of  a  party 

whom  he  abhorred  frequently  refer  to 

him  in  their  own  favour,  142. 
Wobks,  valuable,  not  completed  from 

deficient  encouragement,  130. 


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